Tag Archives: LA Times

July 4, 2024 · 20:03

In the beginning

Two issues came to light, the first one is about an American cop. The BBC gives us (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c72ver6172do) where we see ‘A Bugatti car, a first lady and the fake stories aimed at Americans’. We are given “A network of Russia-based websites masquerading as local American newspapers is pumping out fake stories as part of an AI-powered operation that is increasingly targeting the US election, a BBC investigation can reveal.

A former Florida police officer who relocated to Moscow is one of the key figures behind it.” We knew this, it is nothing new. The Dutch company Trollrensics is actively hunting down trolls and illustrating all the fake news we see (well most of it anyways). This article brought a small art to light that requires actions by both Amazon, Google and Microsoft. You see the BBC gives us “But before the truth could even get its shoes on, the lie had gone viral. Influencers had already picked up the false story and spread it widely”. This is a dangerous setting. Influencers are all about the traffic, they mostly lack integrity and have no clue on the desire to gain followers and their desire to get their golden YouTube sign. 

It is time that the United States and the European Union start to pressure these tech firms to chastise these influencers. If they cannot give ample validation of how they got the evidence how they verified the authenticity they get the full brunt of the consequences. If they are found spreading fake news, their Google rating is diminished, their video’s are all downgraded. And their video’s are skipped in searches unless a person asks for this (former) influencer by name (at which point several people can find the seekers). It is a little crude but the Russians are becoming too much of a nuisance. Oh, and by the way if they follow through on the threat to bomb the Netherlands, I will put my nuclear deterrent (a solution to make a nuclear reactor meltdown) on every BBS in Chechnya. See how they like that condition. Russia made enough enemies, if they have to protect every nuclear reactor in Russia they will lose 15% of their deployable troops protecting buildings they never had to before. Actions are needed and no one is doing them, they are all concerned with the bottom line. You see spreading fake news and false information is not a freedom. In this day and age it is a duty of everyone to not spread fake news and misinformation. Now I understand that not everyone is able to distinguish fake news from real news. I usually seek two official sources (the Guardian, BBC, Al Jazeera, Arab News, Washington Post, Boston Globe, LA Times) there are more but you get the gist. The complication is John Mark Dougan, an American ex-cop. Just questioning. Why would anyone in Florida relocate to Moscow? No matter how valid his reason is. As we are given “an AI-powered operation that is increasingly targeting the US election” we are given the notion that this is all about Trump (my speculation) and it goes from bad to worse. As such I need to do something. I am not a man of action (when you pass the 60 mark that happens) but I have a decent imagination to look outside of the box. Russia has 38 active nuclear reactors. They collectively have 200,000 people working there. Consider that the Russians would need to check them all, secure them all. That implies thousands of troops. Then they need to inspect all new arrivals. It will be a nightmare I reckon. In the mean time they face Chechnya and Pro Ukrainian Russian troops. Plenty to worry about and with the solution out in the open, the Russians get a new danger and optionally their other enemies come out of the woodwork. 

But that is another matter. For now we need to take care of the influencers. They are the first hurdle to stop traction of fake news. In this Amazon, Google and Microsoft could change the rating of anyone spreading fake news, Google especially. Put their ratings to minus 150 and the influencers seize to be a relenting problem. Remove these accounts and their flocks disperse. Now I am not sure if Google can do that. You know that any account holder of a Google/Youtube account has rights. Just changing this on the fly does not go over well. But Google can stop the fake news from spreading, they can also look at the followers of that influencer. But I get ahead of the issues. Something needs to be done and not enough (as far as I can tell) is being done. 

Enjoy the day.

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August 17, 2023 · 17:15

Strike Two

This started earlier. It started weeks ago and I was aware, I took notice. Yet, that was about it. I mean no disrespect. I do not live in the US, I am not California and as such I am merely partially aware. I see what most outside of the US see. We see the strike, but yesterday I saw an opinion piece in the LA Times and that woke me up a little more and would you believe it, this morning I got more awake. There was an advertisement on YouTube, it was the Pilot of Lioness and it was one hell of an ad. It was 50 minutes, it was the pilot. Yup Paramount Plus took their balls and hung them up the wall. OK, this is a first that I watch a 50 minute advertisement. Yet, it was not about the ad, not about Lioness but it gave me focus, so lets begin.

The LA Times Story (at https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2023-08-15/netflix-antitrust-anticompetitive-labor) gives us ‘Hollywood strikes prove Netflix and other streamers have grown too powerful. Time to break them up’ here we are given “Many have called the stalemate an existential crisis because it concerns new issues such as residuals from streaming services and rules for the use of artificial intelligence. These go beyond the usual labor issues such as wages and benefits and cut to the heart of an industry in which streamers such as Netflix can dominate all aspects of the business.” It is one side that I had not seen before. ‘Entertainment’ has become an end-to-end business over ALL verticals. I had not considered that merely because I am not part of this industry, I never was. Yet here we are given “Antitrust laws need to be invoked — as they were in the 1940s in U.S. vs. Paramount — to break up streaming services that both produce content and distribute it. This vertical integration has deeply changed the longstanding entertainment industry ecosystem, which allowed employees to survive and studios to prosper.” Which gets us to “In 1948, the Supreme Court ruled against the studios, requiring them to divest themselves of their movie theatres if they wanted to continue in the production business. Shortly thereafter, theatrical films began to be aired on television with no additional compensation for creative talent. This led to the strike by both the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild in 1960, the last time the two struck simultaneously.”

With finally “If Netflix and its streaming peers like Apple+, Amazon Prime, Disney+ and Max can maintain their vertical control, it will be next to impossible to settle the Hollywood strikes in ways that could preserve the ability of creators and technicians to earn a decent living and protect creative diversity. The old vertical studio system was broken up by the Justice Department. It may be time to do the same with these 21st century behemoths.” And that was the wake up call I needed. The Paramount ‘advertisement’ was apt and consider that Lioness is new stellar series. Kidman, Saldana and several others are making a bundle. They earned it, their work is first rate, as is the director and the director of photography. They all did a stellar job, but it would not have been possible without the writer, without the writer there would be no script, nothing for the director to work from. So how much is he making? 

We see the accusations that the top person, which in the case of Disney is Bob Iger, in 2022 he made well over $14,000,000. This amounts to well over a million a month. Now lets take a look at the image below.

So a series that streamed over 3,000,000,000 minutes, making it one of the most profitable and most successful series even, the writers were collectively paid $3,000. Please explain to me in what universe 3 billion streamed minutes gives us a combined pay check of $3,000? You see those three billion minutes amount to 138,121.5 years. Does it make sense now? The writers are beyond underpaid. They are the legal slaves of America and they deserve their right coin. But American history is seeded with injustice and exploitation and to be honest until the LA Times piece I did not see it, so who else was unaware? We are given snapshots, yet until you see the entire vertical of exploitation it makes little sense and now with that streaming vertical exposed you can see just how unfair it is and one series, the series suits, showed us just how much the writers are fed up with being ignored what should be rightfully theirs.

Enjoy the day.

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March 3, 2023 · 01:18

The blocking question

That is what CB left me with. The article (at https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/alphabet-google-committee-block-summon-1.6762908) gives us “A parliamentary committee is calling four of Google’s top executives to appear before it after the company began testing ways it could block news content from searches if Parliament passes the Online News Act.” And this MP Julian, perhaps MP Julian Assange? No, my bad. It was MP Peter Julian. You see, we do not get the proper setting. And it is not on Google. We are given “Google’s actions have been irresponsible. Google’s actions amount to censorship and Google’s actions are disrespectful of Canadians.” I do not think this is true and because some politicians are trying to remain as vague as possible, issues and question remain, but the people who are pushing this are the remnants of William Randolph Hearst and they all should become as obsolete and buried as Hearst is now. 

They lost credibility and they lost integrity, but that is not how we need to proceed. You see the article gives us “All types of news content are being affected by the test, which will run for about five weeks, the company said. That includes content created by Canadian broadcasters and newspapers. An Australian law similar to C-18 took effect in March 2021 after talks with the big tech firms led to a brief shutdown of Facebook news feeds in the country. The law has largely worked, a government report said.” Well, not exactly, has it?

You see, we are given one line, but it is not one line, it is a document with many paragraphs, many facetted paragraphs. But the politicians do not want to go there, do they? 

This is the first example. It comes from Twitter. The LA Times gives us the heads up, but it is not that, when we click on it it becomes a block. An advertisement block and the LA Times is not alone. So, did we accept that FREE advertisement by the LA Times? That is the question and it is not a simple one line answer. 

The second example is Google search, I wanted something on Bundaberg (where the good rum comes from) and I looked at the news, the top part is what I saw and there is nothing wrong with reading about youthful enthusiasm in medicine, so I clicked on the article, but was I informed? No! I got an invitation to PAY for the article. Lets be clear, it might be OK for newspapers to allow this approach, but is it up to Google Search to cater to free advertisement? These two examples are the tip of a mountain a lot bigger than the ice-block that sank the Titanic, but the article as well as PM Julian are keeping us in the dark about it. There are others like the Guardian, the Dutch NOS, BBC, CBC and many others that do not use this approach, but for news outlets that cater to this approach we see a different catering and I think that Facebook and Google get to block these players. They newspapers are making claims of loss of revenue, but they advertise in this way, so is blocking all the question? I do not think so, but I am not on the board of directors of Google (even after I was able to hand them close to $20,000,000,000 in revenue). Ah well, another day, another dollar.

The block setting is not that simple and these politicians are nowhere neat ready to properly look at this. They want their cowboy story and Google is the nasty evil, but that is not true, it was never true. But then the politicians involved could never figure this out, but that is how I see it, and I accept that others have a different point of view. That is fair, I can only give you my point of view and perhaps it will stir questions, perhaps it will not.

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February 28, 2023 · 02:05

The story not told

This is how it started, but then I realised that there are two stories that are not told. The western media does not want you to know any of it. It makes them simple red light debutantes. Whoring for digital dollars and all at the expense of not informing you. So how are you feeling now?

The story that started this was given to us by Arab News (at https://www.arabnews.com/node/2258916/saudi-arabia) where we are given ‘Saudi project clears 882 Houthi mines in Yemen’ in addition we are given “Overseen by the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center, special teams destroyed five anti-personnel, 195 anti-tank mines, 681 unexploded ordinances and one explosive device” as well as “A total of 388,433 mines have been cleared since the start of the project” but in all this did you consider the larger stage of the issue?

(Photo by Saleh Al-OBEIDI / AFP)

There are two sides. The one side is that Iran was instrumental in delivering over a million mines to Houthi terrorists. The second side is that Saudi Arabia is trying to clear Yemen from these horrific devices, there is of course the third side where we see that the large wining media solutions (The Times, The Guardian, NY Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe and LA Times) as far as I can tell never makes mention of ANY of it. Not the Iranian side of delivering mines. Not the Saudi side of stopping Yemeni casualties. Why is that? There is even an additional side, you see if these media jokes do not change their way, they will soon be less reliable than Arab News and Al Jazeera. And we can add Fox News to the list of useless sources. There is also an upside, these two sources can already be captured with their apps and give you the ACTUAL news regarding the middle east. The photo placed earlier was intentional. It came from Arab News but the source is the AFP, so why is this photo not all over the western news? Why are we kept in the dark on what Iran has been doing? You see Houthi terrorists do not have the means, the materials or the logistics to create a million mines. In the mean time we are given “In June 2022, the project’s contract was extended for another year at a cost of $33.29 million” whilst everyone is ignoring what Iran has been doing. We failed the Yemeni’s in many fronts. We are only partially able to stop weapon smuggle from Iran, We are unable to stop Houthi terrorists and the people doing something about it and that is merely the top of the list. And there is an overbearing other reason. With the claims out there made by 6,047 journalists in the US and over 320,000 journalists in the EU and I, a non-journalists am informing you? Where are these digital dollar seekers? Why is this Arab News not global news informing you on what Iran is part of? How about Houthi terrorists placing over a million mines? Who informed you? There is a decent chance that the western media did not, as far as I can tell, the only active western (French) player is the AFP at present. 

It is time we ask the hard questions from the media and do it in the limelight, preferably asking the stakeholders for their assistance in all this, but that is my sense of humour in action.

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November 18, 2022 · 19:20

Information through confliction

We all have such moment, we are given some parts when things go wrong, this happens, but to the degree we see at present, does it make sense? I think that it is clear that there is almost no one left on the planet who has not heard the name ‘Sam Bankman-Fried’, the media has been bringing it like Jesus of Nazareth was the second coming of this individual. It was only three weeks ago when we were given ‘FTX TO LAUNCH ITS OWN STABLECOIN SOON, SAYS SAM BANKMAN-FRIED’, there we see “The fresh capital injection, which is still subject to negotiations, would keep the crypto conglomerate at the same valuation it had landed after a $400 million funding round back in January. At the time, the cryptocurrency exchange founded by Sam Bankman-Fried was valued at $32 billion. According to leaked financial documents, global trading revenue generated by FTX hit $1.02 billion in 2021, having increased more than 10 times from the $89 million recorded in 2020. Additionally, FTX’s operating income swallowed $272 million throughout last year’s bull run from $14 million a year earlier. FTX saw net income of $388 million last year, up from just $17 million in 2020” and there has been too few questions, no one was looking into matters. Just like the issues surrounding Jack Dorsey. The media had forsaken its duties. It’s like all the paparazzi’ were heralding a 42nd crack maiden as she was giving out free blowjobs to anyone coming along. They had no problems slapping Elon Musk, because he was too arrogant, he was evil. The media had forsaken its duties to the largest degree. To properly inform us and it was at that point when someone informed me of a Dilbert comic. I know off Dilbert, but I do not religiously follow him. I have a book with Dilberts, but that book is at least 20 years old. So I had to look him up and I placed him below.

So here we see what I have been telling you for years, but the person was onto something. If we are to accept the wisdom of Scott Adams, the ‘We’ in the second image represents governments, corporations as well as media interests? It is the last one that was a little forgotten. Not by me, but I was equally not s inclusive as I had needed to be. 

This part becomes clear when we see the Australian Financial Review (at https://www.afr.com/technology/ftx-came-dangerously-close-to-upending-futures-markets-20221117-p5bz5m), there we see ‘FTX came dangerously close to upending futures markets’ with the added “FTX’s ambitions were grandiose: It wanted to carry out every aspect of customers’ crypto derivatives needs on its own, using algorithms rather than brokers to help clear trades”, you think this is it, but it isn’t even close. Yet it lifted the veil and gives us the question “Why was the media asleep?” Things of these nature get noticed and the media was not asking questions. It goes from bad to worse when we see the Guardian giving us ‘Why were so many smart people so dumb about FTX? Did they seriously just like Sam Bankman-Fried’s ‘vibe’?’ (at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/commentisfree/2022/nov/15/why-were-so-many-smart-people-so-dumb-about-ftx-did-they-seriously-just-like-sam-bankman-frieds-vibe-), it is actually a much better question than you think it is. The ‘vibe’ part is indicative and subjective, but the setting of smart people being dumb is central. The media is allegedly supposed to be smart and they never saw it, they never investigated. Was it them or their shareholders, their stake holders and their advertisers that could not stand the sight of critical questions? The fact that I found 6 billion that Google and Amazon overlooked implies they are merely reckless, shortsighted and only optionally stupid. But tell me what company goes around ignoring 6 billion in revenue whilst they are getting ready for recession dropping employees left, right and centre? Then we see the subjective part “The collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange will cost investors billions. But why would anyone give money to a man who plays video games in important meetings?” There is a dangerous stage here. They are not wrong, but it also implies that the important meetings are egocentric. I found 6 billion through video games, in addition, I knew WHERE to look. It implies that these so called important meetings are important to some and not others. Are they therefor important? And we get more information when we see “It seems, however, that FTX was doing some very dubious things: namely, furtively shifting customer funds to Alameda Research, a firm also operated by Bankman-Fried, which then gambled them away on risky trades. Instead of becoming the world’s first trillionaire, SBF saw his net worth plummet from $16.2bn to about $3 overnight. Former US Treasury secretary Larry Summers has likened FTX’s collapse to the Enron scandal, saying that from the reports, there were “whiffs of fraud” about it.” And the information we get is not about SBF or FTX, it is that the media fucked up, it massively fucked up. Who in the media started to look into Alameda Research? How much of the $6.2 billion was lost by the time someone woke up? All questions that the media will not look into or shed light on. Too many got burned by Leveson and when we illuminate that the media has more priority towards digital dollars than to inform the people on events, it is at that point that the people will demand investigation of the media and that scares them. Like fucked up Chihuahua’s they will cry the freedom of the press and the fact that they can police themselves, yet there are enough indications that there is no freedom of the press, there has not been for quite some time and the final push is seen through the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-63662396) where we see ‘New FTX boss condemns crypto exchange’s failure’, a stage that happened 13 hours ago where we are given “The firm filed for bankruptcy in the US last week and, in court filings, Mr Ray said he had never “seen such a complete failure of corporate controls”. Mr Ray, who replaced Sam Bankman-Fried, also criticised a “complete absence of trustworthy financial information”.” In a stage that is a mere three weeks old we see someone from second coming to financial terrorist getting nailed to a cross. And when we realise that this is a stage that was 3 years in the making and the media ignored too many signals and it is time to demand answers. So called idiots making environment claims a mere two days go with “30 newspapers and media organisations in more than 20 countries have taken a common view”, how about you do your fucking jobs and report the news, the actual news, not filtered information!

That setting has been clearly out in the open, but the media does not investigate itself and we are now at a point where the people ned to hold the media to account. When we are given by the BBC “Mr Ray also criticised what he said were “erratic and misleading” public statements by his predecessor. Mr Ray said that FTX had concentrated control in the hands of a “very small group of inexperienced, unsophisticated and potentially compromised individuals”, and that it did not maintain centralised control of its cash. Instead, he said, there was an “absence of an accurate list of bank accounts and account signatories”. So far he said it had been possible to locate “only a fraction of the digital assets” held by the firm.” All this whilst the media was praising some crypto brat like he was evangelising the new economy, and there were no checks, no balances and the media was nowhere to be found. A place like FTX made over a million victims, lost over $16,000,000,000 and the media was nowhere to be found, oh yes, when the carcass was out in the open for everyone to take a bite from, but such numbers aren’t created in a day, there was a long stage of planning and the media was nowhere to be found. Why not?

In light of all the stupidity I see there is now a decent stage where people should consider handing their IP over to China and hope for the best, because our system made a righteous mess of it all and that kind of damage does not happen overnight, it requires the media to forsake its duty to a massive amount. And this is not one media, it is the bulk of them. And my view? When the BBC reports “Meanwhile, Mr Bankman-Fried has told the Vox news website that he regretted filing for bankruptcy.” Vox? And the NY Times, LA Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, Times, the Guardian and others aren’t wondering why the Vox got that little part and none of the others are all over the Crypto Brat? Makes you wonder what else they aren’t looking at, not?

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October 31, 2022 · 20:47

That screwed up media

Here I was, relaxing, looking at tweets when suddenly a tweet Elon Musk passes by (see below). 

Now I had a hard time here. You see I do not trust the media, but the top shelf media (LA Times, SF Chronicle, Boston Globe, and Washington Post) were always above board. Actually there was one more, but it seems that the NY Times now joins the third tier newspapers right next to the Daily Mail (UK). How could any newspaper be so stupid to give us the article (see below). 

The idea that a newspaper does not properly vet the information they have is not new, but in the past the NY Times was always above board. Whether they hate Elon Musk, whether they have other needs (like towards former Twitter owners) or whatever the reason, not vetting information is a problem, it is one I have been talking about for years. When the media cannot differentiate between real news and fake news the media has a problem, they merely hand over the news to TikTokkers like the one claiming that there are a large number of UFO’s over Australia (a TikTok ad), so now you know.

Now what was one the huge and mighty NY Times is now a bringer of debatable fake news, which will deteriorate any other news they bring. Although, I do realise that if Elon Musk was not honest my goose is cooked. Yet Elon Musk has a lot more credibility than most media ever could hope to have, so I am presently siding with the E Musk group. I could not read the whole article because the subscription nag overlapped my article again and again, so there might be an ulterior reason for the NY Times.

In this day and age when we trust the media less and less, they need to bend over backwards to vet the information again and again and hiding behind a mention of Reuters no longer does the trick.

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May 13, 2022 · 21:42

Restoring Redacted Recognisance

I have been in a bit of a trance, wondering on a few items that were nagging me, that is until I saw some flamboyant article. The article is a little too Simpson tainted to be taken seriously, but there was a grain of possibility there. My What if procedures started to crush the options. It did not make me happy, because for the most, I hate the ‘What If’ statement, it is something in second grade salespeople and telemarketers. As such I tend to avoid using it, but in this case there is almost no avoiding it. In a stage where there is an optional stage of revenue that could be anywhere between $400,000,000 and $17,500,000,000 the players Amazon and Google stay away? In the first it is more tailored to Amazon, but the stages include 5G, as such Google would be equally chomping at the bit.
Now the stage is about to move to Saudi Arabia, and I do not object. In two settings they have an advantage over the other two, but that is only in two of the settings. So I was puzzled, but then a few items from LA Times to UK papers hit me and the ‘What If’ setting came back. 

What If
So what if Google and Amazon just no longer have the manpower and the seniority to see what is about to escape them, it seemed so far fetched, but there was supporting evidence (of a sort) and there is no way in hell I would let Microsoft anywhere near it, I would accept a 35% payment from Saudi Arabia before I would consider a 175% from Microsoft, I am that disappointed and angry with them. And as I refocus towards Saudi Arabia I see a larger stage, one that could fir them taking a larger stake in either Amazon Luna or the Google Stadia, even as the Amazon Luna is a better fit, either will do and that solution alone should be worth well over $350,000,000, as such there is some benefit in having one buyer. Of course the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia might see that different, but that is not a given and as they get more options to diversification.

So we have an alternative stage, but the idea that the resources and brainpower of both Amazon and Google had dwindled to that degree is a little baffling. This has nothing to do with Covid. It has nothing to do with abilities. It dwindles down to two powerhouses, not taking a much better inventory of what is possible and letting it slip again and again until it is too late. Could that be the case? To be honest, I cannot tell, in the first because Sundar Pichai and Andy Jassy did not call me updating me on their HR woe’s and sorrows (and I never expect them to do that). So I am in the dark, but some others should not be and we have not heard from them have we? 

So what gives? Why would either player ignore that much revenue after getting hit to such a degree? It does not make sense, but that was before we see that they face a lot of grievance in the UK, EU and US. The Republicans are willing to slice Disney whilst destroying up to 60,000 small business owners with the attacks on Disney and their IP, Google has a few issues of their own to deal with, so a holding pattern is not the weirdest idea, but in this case revenue could go to China, Saudi Arabia and other players, how does that help any of them in the US, EU or UK? And that is before someone takes a hard look at Canada, with the top 10 of wealth being occupied by banks, but that is the hidden trap, without powerful businesses these banks will falter, time has shown that again and again, so what will be left when the redaction of recognisance is takin its toll? Restoration is the one path left, but that is a window with a limited timespan, I wonder if the UK and Canada realise that there is a point of no return and the US waited too long and now when there is a stage of restoration, the republican party is having a go at one of the most powerful IP holder in history, Disney. A setting that can have only one ending and it is not a good one, as such when Disney loses its protection, the cheap solution bringers in India and China will bring their options cheaper, not better but cheaper and all whilst well over 40,000 small business owners are left with nothing, because the IP kept their business safe and that is about to change, so when that happens and other resources do not grasp the business, what do you think will happen to that $25,000,000,000,000 debt? The interest alone will pull the entire US economy under with absolutely no options to restore any option to breathe. A setting I saw coming a mile away 5 years ago when there was an option, so when the US also losses its IP and more important the two powerhouses that create IP because they no longer have resources, what happens then? 

There is no what if setting here, we can just watch it unfold and I will be watching as well, because to be honest, I never expected these two players to have the IP resource lack they are currently showing. I honestly was caught be surprise (you see, it is possible to surprise me).

I wonder what Sunday brings, a hail Mary and a ZX Spectrum?

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March 16, 2022 · 20:42

Ko Inky Dink?

Before I begin, there is something you need to know. I understand and agree that we ALL need anti viral protection. In the old days there was Norton (not that great) and McAfee. There was also Virex (an unknown for Mac’s), over time the setting evolved and in the last 20-30 years it was about the 4 big players Norton, McAfee, Sophos and Kasparsky. I stuck to McAfee and later on Norton. Norton had improved its system and it was basically a turn of a friendly card when I went onto the Norton highway. So for the most I remained in the dark. I hd a program, it seemingly works (you don’t know until things go wrong) and so far no issues (touch wood). It was about 4 weeks ago when I saw something pass by. It was (at https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/kaspersky-discovers-about-100000-new-banking-trojans-and-warns-about-increasing-mobile-malware-sophistication/) with the serious ‘Kaspersky Discovers About 100,000 New Banking Trojans and Warns About Increasing Mobile Malware Sophistication’, for me it was not interesting. I do not trust banking apps, not one of them, the more they offer, the more dangerous they are and as such I do not touch them. I know from the past the X-25 issues that were there and I will not bank online, I will not bank mobile. Some things are better the old way, at least they are somewhat more secure and I have set up triggers to alert me if anyone wants to activate my online banking and mobile banking. So as the article gives us “Kaspersky’s Mobile Threats in 2021 report noted that the number of mobile trojans detected almost doubled in 2021, while the total number of mobile attacks declined during the same period. Sadly, the increased sophistication of the attacks, malware functionality, and attack vectors, coupled with the emergence of new players in the market, compensated for the reduction in the number of attacks.” I saw this coming (to some extent) a mile away, that is why I created a 5G solution that reduces the risk. It does not nullify it, but the transgressions are limited to the high tier hackers, I speculate that I can stop a third of the danger, which is not bad. At that point I did wonder why it was Kaspersky alone that reported it, nothing from the other three, but I left that in the air. So today (late last night) I got alerted to ‘Remove and replace Kaspersky AV, says German cyber intelligence’ (at https://www.itnews.com.au/news/remove-and-replace-kaspersky-av-says-german-cyber-intelligence-577390), which is odd. The timing is definitely off. I am not judging, I cannot tell whether it is true or not, the article does give us “In 2017, the United States banned government agencies from using Kaspersky products, with the European Union following suit the year after.”, as well as “BSI has now extended the advisory to all Kaspersky customers, telling them to swap out the Russian antivirus with an alternative security product.” So what evidence was there. Why was this not in places like The Verge? 

And when we get ““A Russian IT manufacturer can conduct offensive operations itself, be forced to attack target systems against its own will, or be spied on without its knowledge as a victim of a cyber operation, or be used as a tool for attacks against its own customers,” the BSI wrote.” OK, I get it, there is OPTIONALLY a risk and people need to be aware, but if this risk was known in 2017, why was it only now and not two weeks ago that we were informed. Moreover, why is this merely the German intelligence, why does Reuters not have an American point of view with all the ins and outs? There is also “Kaspersky had moved its data infrastructure to Switzerland to counter hacking and spying allegations by Western nations”, which I get. In the end I have questions, is Germany merely an American tool spouting McCarthyism to a larger degree? I wonder why the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) did not counter or support the Switzerland element in that equation. If Russia has tools and support in a place like Switzerland, I reckon that the Swiss would want to know. 

So personally the issue with a coincidence factor is just too weird here. I am not stating the BSI is wrong or misinforming us, but personally I feel that the articles in Reuters and ITNews would require adjustments. The search (Google) gives nothing on Kaspersky and the LA Times, New York Times and Washington Post. Why not? The articles are 18 hours old, one of these three should have picked them up at least 8 hours ago, as such I have questions. Don’t you?

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December 11, 2021 · 19:16

A two sided sword

It is nice (novel too) when the press does your work. Al Jazeera (at https://aje.io/xvndmj) with the headline ‘Nobel Peace Prize winners warn of growing disinformation threat’, which sounds nice, but the complication is that the press is part of the problem, in the last two years 

I looked at issues with the NSO group, Jamal Khashoggi (the reporter no one cares about), one sided accusations against Saudi Arabia, bungled investigations involving Jeff Bezos (and the UN), Ignoring the events from Iran and Houthi forces and that running joke known as the ICIJ with their papers of hope (Pandora papers). All issues that show the press being part of the problem, not a solution. All vying for digital dollars any way they can. 

So when I see “Maria Ressa of the Philippines said the greatest threat to democracy is “when lies become facts”, while Dmitry Muratov of Russia said society is currently in a dangerous “post-truth period””, I am not opposing Maria Ressa, I am stating that the disinformation problem is a lot larger than what we hear and journalists are part of that problem. 

Journalists have with some regularity placed themselves on the axial of a seesaw and tried to keep a balance between events taking place and Stakeholders that need things go certain ways (my speculation/presumption). It is a setting that have been going on since 2012 (which is when I started to take notice). So when I see “Muratov also told Al Jazeera that disinformation was a significant and growing threat. “Manipulation leads to war,” he said. “We are in the middle of a post-truth period. Now, everyone is concerned about their own ideas and not the facts,” Muratov said” I feel an involuntary giggle coming up. It is correct what he states, but the part of ‘Manipulation leads to war’, was this communicated to the morning breakfast shows? Was this communicated to newspapers who do this way too often? 

Yes there are problems and they are all over the place, yet the press is part of the problem, it stopped being part of the solution when shareholders needed to see more money from news outlets. A plate for pigs and there are too many pigs and the plate is seemingly getting smaller. 

So it needs to be clear, I am not opposing the person who achieved the standing of winning a Nobel price, I am however pointing towards the wannabe’s behind these people maximising digital coins at the expense of clear reporting. In case of the ICIJ, has anyone seen a clear dashboard giving us numbers of people per nation, nations with government people involved and non-government people? No, you haven’t. More importantly when we see the stage of those in zero tax nations (and their right to be there), what is left? In that stage we see the ICIJ speak like parrots, repeating the same thing over and over without any real revelations, any real criminal activities. So when you see “The new data reveals confidential information about the owners of offshore entities mostly registered in the British Virgin Islands, a notoriously secretive jurisdiction, between 1980 and 2018.” You get no real information, merely some silly essay person waving his dick. The problem is that this so called “confidential information about the owners of offshore entities”, is absent of criminal activities. It is about tax laws and these clowns have not achieved anything, merely made you all angry that some people get LEGALLY away with avoiding taxation. So Boo Hoo flipping Hoo. 

So I get it that some journalists should receive protection, but in my personal view, we could do without those 600 at the ICIJ brilliantly. The term of “when lies become facts” sounds really nice, but that means that we hold journalists and what they write accountable, an act that hasn’t been the case for the longest of times, should you doubt that, read the Leveson report. The stage is changing and to some degree journalists and news outlets are responsible for that mess. Consider that the big papers which include the Wall Street Journal, The Times, the LA Times, the Washington Post, the Boston globe and the NY Times. How many did a real piece on how tax laws have failed a nation? None as fr as I can tell, they are all screaming ‘Tax the Rich’ but it were these tax laws that got them in that setting. The disregarded acts by Iran are visible all over by the bulk of these papers seemingly disregard these parts, just like the assaults by Houthi’s but they are all eager to slam the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, one sided reporting is disinformation, I hope that this is clear? Filtered information (like morning shows) is also a form of disinformation and they all serve some stakeholder (as I personally see it).

A stage that has to change and it should start with those calling themselves journalists. 

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October 19, 2021 · 02:47

Direction and Course

We are all driven by doubts. We are all driven by needs and we are all enticed by desires. There is no exception, none at all. Not if you are a cleric, Christian or Muslim. Not if you are a farmer or a politician (although too often I think that the first party is more intelligent than the second one). We are all driven by surges, by vectors and by elements outside ourselves. They are the particles that fuel the internal engine in us and the mindset that accompanies it. I remain on the fence regarding the building scandal in Rotterdam, the political power-drive for a place called Vestia. The simplest side is a mere tally, 524 homes are removed to be replaced by 137 locations to inhabit, with an added 101 apartments for higher incomes and 143 apartments for sale, the tally does not add up. A new station is created with -143 locations. This was about money, plain and simple. So whilst Vestia hides behind “We achieve this by taking an effective and innovative approach to rentals, sales, liveability, maintenance, investments and operating costs. We are committed to providing good service to our customers: the people who rent and buy our homes”, so whilst we see one, we also see that they enabled the removal of 387 social housing locations, it was the simplest math problem. Someone got rich here. Yet in the setting of greed, there is so much out there, Rotterdam is not even the smallest blip on any, not even a Dutch radar. 

There is more out there, the stage of the media is getting out of control, stake holders, the setting of lobbyists that are gracing the foundation of media is getting larger, os getting stronger and the media itself does not care, it is like watching a crack whore reach for the goods. Their grasp towards digital dollars without contemplating the larger stage is ludicrous. As an example look at the home page of the Independent (independent.co.uk), the Los Angeles Times (latimes.com), The Washington Post (washingtonpost.com), and Dagens Nyheter (www.dn.se). Notice the advertisements? Let’s be clear, the papers are allowed to do that, yet consider who can afford that. Consider the cost of a front page advertisement in the paper versus the front page of a website. Consider the stage of who gets the visibility and how they got there. Now there is an opposing side to this some are merely advertising, there is no ‘stake holder’, there is no political need, but that stage is fluidic and siding with the stake holders. Consider the past, how many advertisements for some Microsoft device passed you by? How many claims of mobile data for less, how many ads are localised? Consider seeing the LA Times, seeing “Coliving Homes in Sydney. Coliving homes for rent in Sydney from A$1,300/month, inclusive of weekly housekeeping”, now there is nothing wrong with the ad. And it is powered by Google Ads and there is nothing wrong with that. Yet consider that an apartment costing A$1300 a week has an ad on the front page of the LA Times. The setting is so much larger than even I can understand. This is global and this is not some anti-Google setting, I am making the claim that there is a layer between the media and advertisers. Electronic lobbyists, I call them Stake Holders, and they are raking in millions. The view is not easy, and I am not making a claim that I have it, it is so convoluted on the global scale that no one really has an idea, it would require the Google source data and a very powerful computer to suss it out to the smallest degree. I saw glimmers as Microsoft was advertising its Surface pro, but that could just as easily be seen as a glimmer of delusion. The problem is not me, it is not anyone who might not be able to see it, it will be the media, they are part of it. They are setting a new course, they are setting a course towards their digital dollars at the expense of the people, what I often refer to the ‘click bitches’ they create though emotional articles. A newspaper will give you ‘Pandora papers: biggest ever leak of offshore data exposes financial secrets of rich and powerful’, whilst they also give you “the move was not illegal, and there is no evidence the Blairs proactively sought to avoid property taxes” Consider that journalists waste time on non-illegal actions whilst we see some papers give us ‘Houthi blockade restricts aid’, is that not interesting? The UN was all about attacking Saudi Arabia recently whilst keeping (according to media) Houthi and Iranian elements out of that think-tank presentation. So why are we not given the full view whilst some are wasting our time on “the move was not illegal”. I believe that political lobbyists and digital lobbyists are uniting to some extent, optionally the political lobbyists are also on the digital platform calling themselves ‘stake holders’. This is speculation, this is not proven (yet) and there could be all kinds of ‘evidence’ proving me wrong. I do not know yet, but the views I have seen over the last 15 months proving me to be correct more and more. And now, I am taking the light to my work and looking deeper into it all, because anyone not criticising and digging into his own data will fail from the start, and I do not like failure. But that is just me, to seek a direction and course requires energy and it needs a drive, but what that drive is remains open to debate, even for me.

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