A Technologist Realizes Philosophy 101 Was Not All Horse Feathers
January 6, 2025
This is an official dinobaby post. No smart software involved in this blog post.
I am not too keen on non-dinobabies thinking big thoughts about life. The GenX, Y, and Zedders are good at reinventing the wheel, fire, and tacos. What some of these non-dinobabies are less good at is thinking about the world online information has disestablished and is reassembling in chaotic constructs.
The essay, published in HackerNoon, “Here’s Why High Achievers Feel Like Failures” explains why so many non-dinobabies are miserable. My hunch is that the most miserable are those who have achieved some measure of financial and professional success and embrace whinge, insecurity, chemicals to blur mental functions, big car payments, and “experiences.” The essay does a very good job of explaining the impact of getting badges of excellence for making a scoobie (aka lanyard, gimp, boondoggle, or scoubidou) bracelet at summer camp to tweaking an algorithm to cause a teen to seek solace in a controlled substance. (One boss says, “Hey, you hit the revenue target. Too bad about the kid. Let’s get lunch. I’ll buy.”)
The write up explains why achievement and exceeding performance goals can be less than satisfying. Does anyone remember the Google VP who overdosed with the help of a gig worker? My recollection is that the wizard’s boat was docked within a few minutes of his home stuffed with a wifey and some kiddies. Nevertheless, an OnlyFans potential big earner was enlisted to assist with the chemical bliss that may have contributed to his logging off early.
Here’s what the essay offers this anecdote about a high performer whom I think was a entrepreneur riding a rocket ship:
Think about it:
- Three years ago, Mark was ecstatic about his first $10K month. Now, he beats himself up over $800K months.
- Two years ago, he celebrated hiring his first employee. Now, managing 50 people feels like “not scaling fast enough.”
- Last year, a feature in a local business journal made his year. Now, national press mentions barely register.
His progress didn’t disappear. His standards just kept pace with his growth, like a shadow that stretches ahead no matter how far you walk.
The main idea is that once one gets “something”; one wants more. The write up says:
Every time you level up, your brain does something fascinating – it rewrites your definition of “normal.” What used to be a summit becomes your new base camp. And while this psychological adaptation helped our ancestors survive, it’s creating a crisis of confidence in today’s achievement-oriented world.
Yep, the driving force behind achievement is the need to succeed so one can achieve more. I am a dinobaby, and I don’t want to achieve anything. I never did. I have been lucky: Born at the right time. Survived school. Got lucky and was hired on a fluke. Now 60 years later I know how I achieve the modicum of success I accrued. I was really lucky, and despite my 80 years, I am not yet dead.
The essay makes this statement:
We’re running paleolithic software on modern hardware. Every time you achieve something, your brain…
- Quickly normalizes the achievement (adaptation)
- Immediately starts wanting more (drive)
- Erases the emotional memory of the struggle (efficiency)
Is there a fix? Absolutely. Not surprisingly the essay includes a to-do list. The approach is logical and ideally suited to those who want to become successful. Here are the action steps:
Once you’ve reviewed your time horizons, the next step is to build what I call a “Progress Inventory.” Dedicate 15 minutes every Sunday night to reflect and fill out these three sections:
Victories Section
- What’s easier now than it was last month?
- What do you do automatically that used to require thought?
- What problems have disappeared?
- What new capabilities have you gained?
Growth Section
- What are you attempting now that you wouldn’t have dared before?
- Where have your standards risen?
- What new problems have you earned the right to have?
- What relationships have deepened or expanded?
Learning Section
- What mistakes are you no longer making?
- What new insights have you gained?
- What patterns are you starting to recognize?
- What tools have you mastered?
These two powerful tools – the Progress Mirror and the Progress Inventory – work together to solve the central problem we’ve been discussing: your brain’s tendency to hide your growth behind rising standards. The Progress Mirror forces you to zoom out and see the bigger picture through three critical time horizons. It’s like stepping back from a painting to view the full canvas of your growth. Meanwhile, the weekly Progress Inventory zooms in, capturing the subtle shifts and small victories that compound into major transformations. Used together, these tools create something I call “progress consciousness” – the ability to stay ambitious while remaining aware of how far you’ve come.
But what happens when the road map does not lead to a zen-like state? Because I have been lucky, I cannot offer an answer to this question of actual, implicit, or imminent failure. I can serve up some observations:
- This essay has the backbone for a self-help book aimed at insecure high performers. My suggestion is to buy a copy of Thomas Harris’ I’m OK — You’re Okay and make a lot of money. Crank out the merch with slogans from the victories, growth, and learning sections of the book.
- The explanations are okay, but far from new. Spending some time with Friedrich Nietzsche’s Der Wille zur Macht. Too bad Friedrich was dead when his sister assembled the odds and ends of Herr Nietzsche’s notes into a book addressing some of the issues in the HackerNoon essay.
- The write up focuses on success, self-doubt, and an ever-receding finish line. What about the people who live on the street in most major cities, the individuals who cannot support themselves, or the young people with minds trashed by digital flows? The essay offers less information for these under performers as measured by doubt ridden high performers.
Net net: The essay makes clear that education today does not cover some basic learnings; for example, the good Herr Friedrich Nietzsche. Second, the excitement of re-discovering fire is no substitute for engagement with a social fabric that implicitly provides a framework for thinking and behaving in a way that others in the milieu recognize as appropriate. This HackerNoon essay encapsulates why big tech and other successful enterprises are dysfunctional. Welcome to the digital world.
Stephen E Arnold, January 6, 2025
Modern Management Revealed and It Is Jaundiced with a Sickly Yellowish Cast
December 26, 2024
This blog post is the work of an authentic dinobaby. No smart software was used.
I was zipping through the YCombinator list of “important” items and spotted this one: “Time for a Code-Yellow?: A Blunt Instrument That Works.” I associated Code Yellow with the Google knee jerk in early 2023 when Microsoft rolled out its smart software deal with OpenAI. Immediately Google was on the backfoot. Word filtered across the blogs and “real” news sources that the world’s biggest online ad outfit and most easily sued company was reeling. The company declared a “Code Yellow,” a “Code Red,” and probably a Code 300 Terahertz to really goose the Googlers.
Grok does a code yellow. Good enough.
I found the reaction, the fumbling, and the management imperative as wonky as McKinsey getting ensnared in its logical opioid consulting work. What will those MBAs come up with next?
The “Time for a Code Yellow” is interesting. Read it. I want to focus on a handful of supplemental observations which appeared in the comments to the citation for the article. These, I believe, make clear the “problem” that is causing many societal problems including the egregious actions of big companies, some government agencies, and those do-good non-governmental organizations.
Here we go and the italics are my observation on the individual insights:
Tubojet1321 says: “If everything is an emergency, nothing is an emergency.” Excellent observation.
nine_zeros says: “Eventually everyone learns inaction.” Yep, meetings are more important than doing.The fix is to have another meeting.
magical hippo says: “My dad used to flippantly say he had three piles of papers on his desk: “urgent”, “very urgent” and “no longer urgent”. The modern organization creates bureaucratic friction at a much faster pace.
x0x0 says: “I’m utter sh*t at management, [I] refuse to prioritize until it’s a company-threatening crisis, and I’m happy to make my team suffer for my incompetence.” Outstanding self critique.
Lammy says: “The etymology is not green/yellow/red. It’s just not-Yellow or yes-Yellow. See Stephen Levy’s In The Plex (2011) pg186: ‘A Code Yellow is named after a tank top of that color owned by engineering director Wayne Rosing. During Code Yellow a leader is given the shirt and can tap anyone at Google and force him or her to drop a current project to help out. Often, the Code Yellow leader escalates the emergency into a war room situation and pulls people out of their offices and into a conference room for a more extended struggle.’ Really? I thought the popularization of “yellow” as a caution or warning became a shared understanding in the US with the advent of trains long before T shirts and Google. Note: Train professionals used a signaling system before Messrs. Brin and Page “discovered” Jon Kleinberg’s CLEVER patent.
lizzas says: “24/7 oncall to … be yanked onto something the boss fancies. No thanks. What about… planning?” Planning. Let’s call a meeting, talk about a plan, then have a meeting to discuss options, and finally have a meeting to do planning. Sounds like a plan.
I have a headache from the flashing yellow lights. Amazing about Google’s originality, isn’t it? Oh, over the holiday downtime, check out Dr. Jon Kleinberg and what he was doing at IBM’s Almaden Research Laboratory in US6112202, filed in 1997. Are those yellow lights still flashing?
Stephen E Arnold, December 26, 2024
The Modern Manager Confronts Old Realities in an AI World
December 18, 2024
This blog post is the work of an authentic dinobaby. No smart software was used.
Beleaguered
I read and got a kick out of “Parkinson’s Law: It’s Real, So Use It.” The subtitle: “Yes, Just Set That Deadline.” The main idea is that deadlines are necessary. Loosely translated to modern technology lingo: “Ship it. We will fix it with an update.”
The write up says:
Projects that don’t have deadlines imposed on them, even if they are self-imposed, will take a lot longer than they need to, and may suffer from feature creep and scope bloat. By setting challenging deadlines you will actually get better results.
Yesterday evening I received an email asking for some information related to a lecture we delivered earlier in the day. My first question was, “What’s the deadline?” No answer came back. I worked on a project earlier this year and deadlines were dots on a timeline. No dates, just blobs in months. We did a small project for an AI outfit. Nothing actually worked but I was asked, “How’s your part coming?” It wasn’t.
I concluded from these 2024 interactions that planning was not a finely tuned skill in four different, big time, high aspiration companies. Yet, here is a current article advocating for deadlines. I think the author has been caught in the same weird time talk my team and I have.
The author says:
Deadlines force a clear tempo and cadence and, fundamentally, they make things happen.
I agree. Deadlines make things happen. In my experience, that means, “Ship it. We will fix it with updates.” (Does that sound familiar?)
This essay makes clear to me that today’s crop of “managers” understand that some basics work really well. However, are today’s managers sufficiently informed to think through the time and resources required to deliver a high value, functional product or service. I would respectfully submit that there are some examples of today’s managers confusing marketing jabber and the need to make sales with getting work done so a product actually works. Consider these examples:
- Google’s announcements about quantum breakthroughs. Do they work? Sure, well, sort of.
- Microsoft’s broken image generation function in Copilot. Well, it worked and then it didn’t.
- Amazon’s quest to get Alexa to be more than a kitchen timer using other firms’ technology. Yeah, that is costing how much?
Knowing what to do — that is, setting a deadline— and creating something that really works — that is, an operating system which allows a user to send a facsimile or print a document — are interdependent capabilities. Managers who don’t know what is required cannot set a meaningful deadline. That’s what’s so darned interesting about Apple’s AI. Exactly when was that going to be available? Yeah. Soon, real soon. And that quantum computing stuff? Soon, real soon. And artificial general intelligence? It’s here now, pal.
Stephen E Arnold, December 18, 2024
Technology Managers: Do Not Ask for Whom the Bell Tolls
December 18, 2024
This blog post is the work of an authentic dinobaby. No smart software was used.
I read the essay “The Slow Death of the Hands-On Engineering Manager.” On the surface, the essay provides some palliative comments about a programmer who is promoted to manager. On a deeper level, the message I carried from the write up was that smart software is going to change the programmer’s work. As smart software become more capable, the need to pay people to do certain work goes down. At some point, some “development” may skip the human completely.
Thanks OpenAI ChatGPT. Good enough.
Another facet of the article concerned a tip for keeping one’s self in the programming game. The example chosen was the use of OpenAI’s ChatGPT open source software to provide “answers” to developers. Thus instead of asking a person, a coder could just type into the prompt box. What could be better for an introvert who doesn’t want to interact with people or be a manager? The answer is, “Not too much.”
What the essay makes clear is that a good coder may get promoted to be a manager. This is a role which illustrates the Peter Principle. The 1969 book explains why incompetent people can get promoted. The idea is that if one is a good coder, that person will be a good manager. Yep, it is a principle still evident in many organizations. One of its side effects is a manager who knows he or she does not deserve the promotion and is absolutely no good at the new job.
The essay unintentionally makes clear that the Peter Principle is operating. The fix is to do useful things like eliminate the need to interact with colleagues when assistance is required.
John Donne in the 17th century wrote a poorly structured sonnet which asserted:
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
The cited essay provides a way to further that worker isolation.
With AI the top-of-mind thought for most bean counters, the final lines of the sonnet is on point:
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
My view is that “good enough” has replaced individual excellence in quite important jobs. Is this AI’s “good enough” principle?
Stephen E Arnold, December 17, 2024
We Need a Meeting about Meetings after I Get Back from a Meeting
December 10, 2024
This blog post flowed from the sluggish and infertile mind of a real live dinobaby. If there is art, smart software of some type was probably involved.
I heard that Mr. Jeff Bezos, the Big Daddy of online bookstores, likes chaotic and messy meetings. Socrates might not have been down with that approach.
As you know, Socrates was a teacher who ended up dead because he asked annoying questions. “Socratic thinking” helps people remain open to new ideas. Do new ideas emerge from business meetings? Most of those whom I know grumble, pointing out to me that meetings waste their time. Michael Poczwardowski challenges that assumption with Socratic thinking in the Perspectiveship post “Socratic Questioning – ‘Meetings are a waste of time’”.
Socratic-based discussions are led by someone who only asks questions. By asking only questions the discussion can then focus on challenging assumptions, critical thinking, and first principles-dividing problems into basic elements to broaden perspectives and understanding. Poczwardowski brings the idea that: “meetings are a waste of time” to the discussion forum.
Poczwardowski introduces readers to Socratic thinking with the steps of classification, challenge assumptions, look for data/evidence, change perspective, explore consequences and implications, and question the question. Here’s my summary done my a person with an advanced degree in information science. (I know I am not as smart as Google’s AI, but I do what I can with my limited resources, thank you.)
“The key is to remain open to possibilities and be ready to face our beliefs. Socratic questioning is a great way to work on improving our critical thinking.
When following Socratic questioning ask to:
• Clarify the idea: It helps us understand what we are talking about and to be on the same page
• Challenge assumptions: Ask them to list their assumptions.
• Look for evidence: Asking what kind of evidence they have can help them verify the sources of their beliefs
• Change perspectives: Look at the problem from others’ points of view.
• Explore consequences: Explore the possible outcomes and effects of actions to understand their impact”
Am I the only one who thinks this also sounds obvious? Ancient philosophers did inspire the modern approach to scientific thought. Galileo demonstrated that he would recant instead of going to prison or being killed. Perhaps I should convene a meeting to decide if the meeting is a waste of time. I will get back to you. I have a meeting coming up.
Whitney Grace, December 10, 2024
More Googley Human Resource Goodness
November 22, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
The New York Post reported that a Googler has departed. “Google News Executive Shailesh Prakash Resigns As Tensions with Publishers Mount: Report” states:
Shailesh Prakash had served as a vice president and general manager for Google News. A source confirmed that he is no longer with the company… The circumstances behind Prakash’s resignation were not immediately clear. Google declined to comment.
Google tapped a professional who allegedly rode in the Bezos bulldozer when the world’s second or third richest man in the world acquired the Washington Post. (How has that been going? Yeah.)
Thanks, MidJourney. Good enough.
Google has been cheerfully indexing content and selling advertising for decades. After a number of years of talking and allegedly providing some support to outfits collecting, massaging, and making “real” news available, the Google is facing some headwinds.
The article reports:
The Big Tech giant rankled online publishers last May after it introduced a feature called “AI Overviews” – which places an auto-generated summary at the top of its search results while burying links to other sites. News Media Alliance, a nonprofit that represents more than 2,200 publishers, including The Post, said the feature would be “catastrophic to our traffic” and has called on the feds to intervene.
News flash from rural Kentucky: The good old days of newspaper publishing are unlikely to make a comeback. What’s the evidence for this statement? Video and outfits like Telegram and WhatsApp deliver content to cohorts who don’t think too much about a print anything.
The article pointed out:
Last month, The Post exclusively reported on emails that revealed how Google leveraged its access to the Office of the US Trade Representative as it sought to undermine overseas regulations — including Canada’s Online News Act, which required Google to pay for the right to display news content.
You can read that report “Google Emails with US Trade Reps Reveal Cozy Ties As Tech Giant Pushed to Hijack Policy” if you have time.
Let’s think about why a member of Google leadership like Shailesh Prakash would bail out. Among the options are:
- He wanted to spend more time with his family
- Another outfit wanted to hire him to manage something in the world of publishing
- He failed in making publishers happy.
The larger question is, “Why would Google think that one fellow could make a multi-decade problem go away?” The fact that I can ask this question reveals how Google’s consulting infused leaders think about an entire business sector. It also provides some insight into the confidence of a professional like Mr. Prakash.
What flees sinking ships? Certainly not the lawyers that Google will throw at this “problem.” Google has money and that may be enough to buy time and perhaps prevail. If there aren’t any publishers grousing, the problem gets resolved. Efficient.
Stephen E Arnold, November 22, 2024
Management Brilliance Microsoft Suggests to Customers, “You Did It!”
November 21, 2024
No smart software. Just a dumb dinobaby. Oh, the art? Yeah, MidJourney.
I read an amusing write up called “Microsoft Says Unexpected Windows Server 2025 Automatic Upgrades Were Due to Faulty Third-Party Tools.” I love a management action which points the fingers at “you” — Partners, customers, and anyone other than the raucous Redmond-ians.
Good enough, MidJourney. Good enough.
The write up says that Microsoft says:
“Some devices upgraded automatically to Windows Server 2025 (KB5044284). This was observed in environments that use third-party products to manage the update of clients and servers,” Microsoft explained. “Please verify whether third-party update software in your environment is configured not to deploy feature updates. This scenario has been mitigated.”
The article then provides a translation of Microsoftese:
In other words, it’s not Microsoft – it’s you. The company also added the update had the “DeploymentAction=OptionalInstallation” tag, which patch management tools should read as being an optional, rather than recommended update.
Several observations:
- Pointing fingers works in some circumstances. Kindergarten type interactions feature the tactic.
- The problems of updates seem to be standard operating procedure.
- Bad actors love these types of reports because anecdotes about glitches and flaws say, “Come on in, folks.”
Is this a management strategy or an indicator of other issues?
Stephen E Arnold, November 21, 2024
Management Brilliance or Perplexing Behavior
November 15, 2024
Sorry to disappoint you, but this blog post is written by a dumb humanoid. The art? We used MidJourney.
TechCrunch published “Perplexity CEO Offers AI Company’s Services to Replace Striking NYT Staff.” The New York Times Tech Guild went on strike. Aravind Srinivas, formerly at OpenAI and founder of Perplexity, made an interesting offer. According to the cited article, Mr. Srinivas allegedly said he would provide services to “mitigate the effect of a strike by New York Times tech workers.”
A young startup luminary reacts to a book about business etiquette. His view of what’s correct is different from what others have suggested might win friends and influence people. Thanks, MidJourney. Good enough.
Two points: Crossing the picket lines seemed okay if the story is correct and assuming that Perplexity’s smart software would “mitigate the effect” of the strike.
According to the article, “many” people criticized Mr. Srinivas’ offer to help a dead tree with some digital ornaments in a time of turmoil. What the former OpenAI wizard suggested he wanted to do was:
to provide technical infra support on a high traffic day.
Infra, I assume, is infrastructure. And a high-traffic day at a dead tree business is? I just don’t know. The Gray Lady has an online service and it bought an eGame which lacks the bells and whistles of Hamster Kombat. I think that Hamster Kombat has a couple of hundred million users and a revenue stream from assorted addictive elements jazzed with tokens. Could Perplexity help out Telegram if its distributed network ran into more headwinds that the detainment of its founder in France?
Furthermore, the article reminded me that the Top Dog of the dead tree outfit “sent Perplexity a cease and desist letter in October [2024] over the startup’s scraping of articles for use by its AI models.”
What interests me, however, is the outstanding public relations skills that Mr. Srinivas demonstrated. He has captured headlines with his “infra” offer. He is getting traction on Twitter, now the delightfully named X.com. He is teaching old-school executives like Tim Apple how to deal with companies struggling to adapt to the AI, go fast approach to business.
Perplexity’s offer illustrates a conceptual divide between old school publishing, labor unions, and AI companies. Silicon Valley outfits have a deft touch. (I almost typed “tone deaf”. Yikes.)
Stephen E Arnold, November 15, 2024
Meta and China: Yeah, Unauthorized Use of Llama. Meh
November 8, 2024
This post is the work of a dinobaby. If there is art, accept the reality of our using smart art generators. We view it as a form of amusement.
That open source smart software, you remember, makes everything computer- and information-centric so much better. One open source champion laboring as a marketer told me, “Open source means no more contractual handcuffs, the ability to make changes without a hassle, and evidence of the community.
An AI-powered robot enters a meeting. One savvy executive asks in Chinese, “How are you? Are you here to kill the enemy?” Another executive, seated closer to the gas emitted from a cannister marked with hazardous materials warnings gasps, “I can’t breathe!” Thanks, Midjourney. Good enough.
How did those assertions work for China? If I can believe the “trusted” outputs of the “real” news outfit Reuters, just super cool. “Exclusive: Chinese Researchers Develop AI Model for Military Use on Back of Meta’s Llama”, those engaging folk of the Middle Kingdom:
… have used Meta’s publicly available Llama model to develop an AI tool for potential military applications, according to three academic papers and analysts.
Now that’s community!
The write up wobbles through some words about the alleged Chinese efforts and adds:
Meta has embraced the open release of many of its AI models, including Llama. It imposes restrictions on their use, including a requirement that services with more than 700 million users seek a license from the company. Its terms also prohibit use of the models for “military, warfare, nuclear industries or applications, espionage” and other activities subject to U.S. defense export controls, as well as for the development of weapons and content intended to “incite and promote violence”. However, because Meta’s models are public, the company has limited ways of enforcing those provisions.
In the spirit of such comments as “Senator, thank you for that question,” a Meta (aka Facebook), wizard allegedly said:
“That’s a drop in the ocean compared to most of these models (that) are trained with trillions of tokens so … it really makes me question what do they actually achieve here in terms of different capabilities,” said Joelle Pineau, a vice president of AI Research at Meta and a professor of computer science at McGill University in Canada.
My interpretation of the insight? Hey, that’s okay.
As readers of this blog know, I am not too keen on making certain information public. Unlike some outfits’ essays, Beyond Search tries to address topics without providing information of a sensitive nature. For example, search and retrieval is a hard problem. Big whoop.
But posting what I would term sensitive information as usable software for anyone to download and use strikes me as something which must be considered in a larger context; for example, a bad actor downloading an allegedly harmless penetration testing utility of the Metasploit-ilk. Could a bad actor use these types of software to compromise a commercial or government system? The answer is, “Duh, absolutely.”
Meta’s founder of the super helpful Facebook wants to bring people together. Community. Kumbaya. Sharing.
That has been the lubricant for amassing power, fame, and money… Oh, also a big gold necklace similar to the one’s I saw labeled “Pharaoh jewelry.”
Observations:
- Meta (Facebook) does open source for one reason: To blunt initiatives from its perceived competitors and to position itself to make money.
- Users of Meta’s properties are only data inputters and action points; that is, they are instrumentals.
- Bad actors love that open source software. They download it. They study it. They repurpose it to help the bad actors achieve their goals.
Did Meta include a kill switch in its open source software? Oh, sure. Meta is far-sighted, concerned with misuse of its innovations, and super duper worried about what an adversary of the US might do with that technology. On the bright side, if negotiations are required, the head of Meta (Facebook) allegedly speaks Chinese. Is that a benefit? He could talk with the weaponized robot dispensing biological warfare agents.
Stephen E Arnold, November 8, 2024
Microsoft 24H2: The Reality Versus Self Awareness
November 4, 2024
Sorry. Written by a dumb humanoid. Art? It is AI, folks. Eighty year old dinobabies cannot draw very well in my experience.
I spotted a short item titled “Microsoft Halts Windows 11 24H2 Update for Many PCs Due to Compatibility Issues.” Today is October 29, 2024. By the time you read this item, you may have a Windows equipped computer humming along on the charmingly named 11 24H2 update. That’s the one with Recall.
Microsoft does not see itself as slightly bedraggled. Those with failed updates do. Thanks, ChatGPT, good enough, but at least you work. MSFT Copilot has been down for six days with a glitch.
Now if you work at the Redmond facility where Google paranoia reigns, you probably have Recall running on your computing device as well as Teams’ assorted surveillance features. That means that when you run a query for “updates”, you may see screens presenting an array of information about non functioning drivers, printer errors, visits to the wonderfully organized knowledge bases, and possibly images of email from colleagues wanting to take kinetic action about the interns, new hires, and ham fisted colleagues who rolled out an update which does not update.
According to the write up offers this helpful advice:
We advise users against manually forcing the update through the Windows 11 Installation Assistant or media creation tool, especially on the system configurations mentioned above. Instead, users should check for updates to the specific software or hardware drivers causing the holds and wait for the blocks to be lifted naturally.
Okay.
Let’s look at this from the point of view of bad actors. These folks know that the “new” Windows with its many nifty new features has some issues. When the Softies cannot get wallpaper to work, one knows that deeper, more subtle issues are not on the wizards’ radar.
Thus, the 24H2 update will be installed on bad actors’ test systems and subjected to tests only a fan of Metasploit and related tools can appreciate. My analogy is that these individuals, some of whom are backed by nation states, will give the update the equivalent of a digital colonoscopy. Sorry, Redmond, no anesthetic this go round.
Why?
Microsoft suggests that security is Job Number One. Obviously when fingerprint security functions don’t work and the Windows Hello fails, the bad actor knows that other issues exist. My goodness. Why doesn’t Microsoft just turn its PR and advertising firms lose on Telegram hacking groups and announce, “Take me. I am yours!”
Several observations:
- The update is flawed
- Core functions do not work
- Partners, not Microsoft, are supposed to fix the broken slot machine of operating systems
- Microsoft is, once again, scrambling to do what it should have done correctly before releasing a deeply flawed bundle of software.
Net net: Blaming Google for European woes and pointing fingers at everything and everyone except itself, Microsoft is demonstrating that it cannot do a basic task correctly. The only users who are happy are those legions of bad actors in the countries Microsoft accuses of making its life difficult. Sorry. Microsoft you did this, but you could blame Google, of course.
Stephen E Arnold, November 4, 2024
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