A Lesson in Negotiation: A Scholarly Analysis of the Musk-Zuck Interaction
July 10, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
“Zuck Is a Cuck: Elon Musk Ramps Up His Attacks on Mark Zuckerberg With Shocking Tweet” provides an example of mature decision making, eloquent rhetoric, and the thrill of the high school insult. Maybe, it is a grade-school thrill, similar to someone pointing at overweight me with thick glasses and a book to read just for fun. I can hear the echoes of these memorable words, “Look at smarty pants. Yah yah yah.” I loved every minute of these insults.
“What did you call me? You keep your mouth shut or my friends and I will post on both Threads and Twitter that you do drugs and steal to buy junk.” Yes, the intellectual discourse of those in the prime of adolescence. And what’s the rejoinder, “Yeah, well, I will post those pix you sent me and email them to your loser mom. What do you think about that, you, you [censored]?”
The cited article from Mediaite (which I don’t know how to pronounce) reports:
Threads drew tens of millions of users since its launch three days ago, so the competition between Musk and Zuckerberg is being waged on social, legal, and perhaps even physical fronts with talk of a cage match fight between the two. Despite the numerous setbacks Twitter has seen since Musk took it over, he has spent the weekend hyping up improvements to the platform while taking shots at Zuckerberg.
What business school teaching moment is this? [a] Civil discourse triumphs, [b] Friendly competition is a net positive, [c] Ad hominem arguments are an exceptional argumentative tool, [d] Emotional intelligence is a powerful opportunity magnet.
What? Why no [e] All of the above?
Note for those who don’t like my characterization of Silicon Valley luminaries’ manifestation of “the high school science club management method. Isn’t it time to accept HS-SC-MM as the one “true way” to riches, respect, and power?
Stephen E Arnold, July 10, 2023
TikTok Interface: Ignoring the Big Questions
July 10, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
I read “TikTok Is Confusing by Design.” That’s correct. But the write up does not focus on the big questions. However, the article tiptoes up to the $64 question and then goes for a mocha latte. Very modern.
A number of articles ignore flashing red lights. William James called this “a certain blindness.” Thanks, MidJourney to a wonderful illustration crafted from who knows what.
Note these snippets from the essay:
- a controlled experience that’s optimized to know or decide what we want and then deliver it to us.
- You don’t get to choose from a list of related content, nor is there any real order to whatever you’ll get.
- It’s a comfortable space to be in when you don’t have to make choices.
- TikTok’s approach has become the new standard. Part of that standard is aggressively pushing content at you that the app has decided you want to see.
So what are the big questions? The article shoves them to the end of the essay. Will people persist and ponder them? Don’t big questions warrant a more compelling presentation?
Here’s a big question:
“Who gets to control what you are seeing of reality?”
The answer is obvious in the case of TikTok: Entities in some way linked to the Chinese government.
And what about online services working overtime to duplicate the TikTok model? Who is in control of the content, its context, and its concepts?
The answer is, “An outfit that will have unprecedented amount of influence over users’ thoughts and actions.” If those users — digital addicts, perhaps — are not able to recognize manipulation or simply choose to say, “Hey, no big deal”, TikTok-type content systems will be driving folks down the Information Highway. Riders may have no choice. Riders may have to pay to driven around. Riders may not be in control of their behaviors, ideas, and time.
I like the idea of TikTok as an interface. I don’t like touching on big questions and then sidestepping them.
Net net: I won’t pay for access to Vox.
Stephen E Arnold, July 10, 2023
Google and AMP: Good Enough
July 10, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
Due to the rise of mobile devices circa the 2010s, the Internet was slammed with slow-loading Web-sites. In 2015, Google told publishers it had a solution dubbed “Accelerated Mobile Pages” (AMP). Everyone bought into AMP but it soon proved to be more like a “Speed Trap” says The Verge.
AMP worked well at first but it was hard to use advertising tools that were not from Google. Google’s plan to make the Internet great again backfired. Seventeen state attorneys filed a lawsuit with AMP as a key topic against Google in 2020. The lawsuit alleges Google purposefully designed AMP to prevent publishers from using alternative ad tools. The US Justice Department filed an antitrust lawsuit in January 2023, claiming Google is attempting to control more of the Internet.
A creature named Googzilla chats with a well-known publisher about a business relationship. Googzilla is definitely impressed with the publisher’s assertion that quality news can generate traffic and revenue without a certain Web search company’s help. Does the publisher trust Googzilla? Sure, the publisher says, “We just have lunch and chat. No problem.”
Google promised that AMP would drive more traffic to publishers’ Web sites and it would fix the loading speed lag. Google was the only big tech company that offered a viable solution to the growing demand mobile devices created, so everyone was forced to adopt AMP. Google did not care as long as it was the only player in the game:
“As long as anyone played the game, everybody had to. ‘Google’s strategy is always to create prisoner’s dilemmas that it controls — to create a system such that if only one person defects, then they win,’ a former media executive says. As long as anyone was willing to use AMP and get into that carousel, everyone else had to do the same or risk being left out.”
Google promised AMP would be open source but Google flip-flopped on that decision whenever it suited the company. Non-Google developers “fixed” AMP by working through its locked down structure so it could support other tools. Because of their efforts AMP got better and is now a decent tool. Google, however, trundles along. Perhaps Google is just misunderstood.
Whitney Grace, July 10, 2023
Whom Does One Trust? Surprise!
July 7, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
Whom does one trust? The answer — according to the estimable New York Post — is young people. Believe it or not. Just be sure to exclude dinobabies and millennials, of course.
“Millennials Are the Biggest Liars of All Generations, Survey Reveals”:
A new survey found that of all generations, those born between 1981 and 1996 are the biggest culprits of lying in the workplace and on social media.
Am I convinced that the survey is spot on? Nah. Am I confident that millennials are the biggest liars when the cohort is considered? Nah.
MidJourney generated this illustration of an angry sales manager confronting a worker. The employee reported sales as closed when they were pending. Who would do this? A dinobaby, a millennial, or a regular sales professional?
Am I entertained by the idea that dinobabies are not the most prone to prevarication and mendacity? Yes.
Consider this statement:
The findings showed that millennials were the worst offenders, with 13% copping to being dishonest at least once a day.
How many times do dinobabies eject a falsehood?
By contrast, only 2% of baby boomers, those born between 1946 and 1964, fibbed once per day.
One must be aware that GenXers just five percent engage in “daily deception.”
Where do people take liberties with the truth? Résumés (hello, LinkedIn) and social media. Imagine that! Money and companionship.
Who lies the most? Yep, 26 percent of males lie once a day. Twenty-three percent of females emit deceptive statements once a day. No other genders were considered in the write up, which is an important oversight in my opinion.
And who ran the survey? An outfit named PlayStar. Yes! I wonder if the survey tool was a Survey Monkey-like system.
Stephen E Arnold, July 7, 2023
Amazon: Machine-Generated Content Adds to Overhead Costs
July 7, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
“Amazon Has a Big Problem As AI-Generated Books Flood Kindle Unlimited” makes it clear that Amazon is going to have to re-think how it runs its self-publishing operation and figure out how to deal with machine-generated books from “respected” publishers.
The author of the article is expressing concern about ChatGPT-type outputs being assembled into electronic books. That concern is focused on Amazon and its ageing, arthritic Kindle eBook business. With voice to text tools, I suppose one should think about Audible audiobooks spit out by text-to-voice. The culprit, however, may be Amazon itself. Paying a person read a book for seven hours, not screw up, and making sure the sound is acceptable when the reader has a stuffed nose can be pricey.
A senior Amazon executive thinks to herself, “How can I fix this fake content stuff? I should really update my LinkedIn profile too.’ Will the lucky executive charged with fixing the problem identified in the article be allowed to eliminate revenue? Yep, get going on the LinkedIn profile first. Tackle the fake stuff later.
The write up points out:
the mass uploading of AI-generated books could be used to facilitate click-farming, where ‘bots’ click through a book automatically, generating royalties from Amazon Kindle Unlimited, which pays authors by the amount of pages that are read in an eBook.
And what’s Amazon doing about this quasi-fake content? The article reports:
It [Amazon] didn’t explicitly state that it was making an effort specifically to address the apparent spam-like persistent uploading of nonsensical and incoherent AI-generated books.
Then, the article raises the issues of “quality” and “authenticity.” I am not sure what these two glory words mean. My impression is that a machine-generated book is not as good as one crafted by a subject matter expert or motivated human author. If I am right, the editors at TechRadar are apparently oblivious to the idea of using XML structure content and a MarkLogic-type tool to slice-and-dice content. Then the components are assembled into a reference book. I want to point out that this method has been in use by professional publishers for a number of years. Because I signed a confidentiality agreement, I am not able to identify this outfit. But I still recall the buzz of excitement that rippled through one officer meeting at this outfit when those listening to a presentation realized [a] Humanoids could be terminated and a reduced staff could produce more books and [b] the guts of the technology was a database, a technology mostly understood by those with a few technical conferences under their belt. Yippy! No one had to learn anything. Just calculate the financial benefit of dumping humans and figuring out how to expense the contractors who could format content from a hovel in a Myanmar-type of low-cost location. At night, the executives dreamed about their bonuses for hitting their financial targets and how to start RIF’ing editorial staff, subject matter experts, and assorted specialists who doodled with front matter, footnotes, and fonts.
Net net: There is no fix. The write up illustrates the lack of understanding about how large sections of the information industry uses technology and the established procedures for dealing with cost-saving opportunity. Quality means more revenue from decisions. Authenticity is a marketing job. Amazon has a content problem and has to gear up its tools and business procedures to cope with machine-generated content whether in product reviews and eBooks.
Stephen E Arnold, July 7, 2023
Pricing Smart Software: Buy Now Because Prices Are Going Up in 18 hours 46 Minutes and Nine Seconds, Eight Seconds, Seven…
July 7, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
I ignore most of the apps, cloud, and hybrid products and services infused with artificial intelligence. As one wit observed, AI means artificial ignorance. What I find interesting are the pricing models used by some of the firms. I want to direct your attention to Sheeter.ai. The service let’s one say in natural language something like “Calculate the median of A:Z rows.” The system then spits out the Excel formula which can be pasted into a cell. The Sheeter.ai formula works in Google Sheets too because Google wants to watch Microsoft Excel shrivel and die a painful death. The benefits of the approach are similar to services which convert SQL statements into well-formed SQL code (in theory). Will the dynamic duo of Google and Microsoft implement a similar feature in their spreadsheets? Of course, but Sheeter.ai is betting their approach is better.
The innovation for which Sheeter.ai deserves a pat on the back is its approach to pricing. The screenshot below makes clear that the price one sees on the screen at a particular point in time is going to go up. A countdown timer helps boost user anxiety about price.
I was disappointed when the graphics did not include a variant of James Bond (the super spy) chained to an explosive device. Bond, James Bond, was using his brain to deactivate the timer. Obviously he was successful because there have been a half century of Bond, James Bond, films. He survives every time time.
Will other AI-infused products and services implement anxiety patterns to induce people to provide their name, email, and credit card? It seems in line with the direction in which online and AI businesses are moving. Right, Mr. Bond. Nine, eight, seven….
Stephen E Arnold, July 7, 2023
Googzilla Annoyed: No Longer to Stomp Around Scaring People
July 6, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
“Sweden Orders Four Companies to Stop Using Google Tool” reports that the Swedish government “has ordered four companies to stop using a Google tool that measures and analyzed Web traffic.” The idea informing the Swedish decision to control the rapacious creature’s desire for “personal data.” Is the lovable Googzilla slurping data and allegedly violating privacy? I have no idea.
In this MidJourney visual confection, it appears that a Tyrannosaurus Rex named Googzilla is watching children. Is Googzilla displaying an abnormal and possibly illegal behavior, particularly with regard to personal data.
The write up states:
The IMY said it considers the data sent to Google Analytics in the United States by the four companies to be personal data and that “the technical security measures that the companies have taken are not sufficient to ensure a level of protection that essentially corresponds to that guaranteed within the EU…”
Net net: Sweden is not afraid of the Google. Will other countries try their hand at influencing the lovable beastie?
Stephen E Arnold, July 6, 2023
Google and Its Use of the Word “Public”: A Clever and Revenue-Generating Policy Edit
July 6, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
If one has the cash, one can purchase user-generated data from more than 500 data publishers in the US. Some of these outfits are unknown. When a liberal Wall Street Journal reporter learns about Venntel or one of these outfits, outrage ensues. I am not going to explain how data from a user finds its ways into the hands of a commercial data aggregator or database publisher. Why not Google it? Let me know how helpful that research will be.
Why are these outfits important? The reasons include:
- Direct from app information obtained when a clueless mobile user accepts the Terms of Use. Do you hear the slurping sounds?
- Organizations with financial data and savvy data wranglers who cross correlate data from multiple sources?
- Outfits which assemble real-time or near-real-time user location data. How useful are those data in identifying military locations with a population of individuals who exercise wearing helpful heart and step monitoring devices?
Navigate to “Google’s Updated Privacy Policy States It Can Use Public Data to Train its AI Models.” The write up does not make clear what “public data” are. My hunch is that the Google is not exceptionally helpful with its definitions of important “obvious” concepts. The disconnect is the point of the policy change. Public data or third-party data can be purchased, licensed, used on a cloud service like an Oracle-like BlueKai clone, or obtained as part of a commercial deal with everyone’s favorite online service LexisNexis or one of its units.
A big advertiser demonstrates joy after reading about Google’s detailed prospect targeting reports. Dossiers of big buck buyers are available to those relying on Google for online text and video sales and marketing. The image of this happy media buyer is from the elves at MidJourney.
The write up states with typical Silicon Valley “real” news flair:
By updating its policy, it’s letting people know and making it clear that anything they publicly post online could be used to train Bard, its future versions and any other generative AI product Google develops.
Okay. “the weekend” mentioned in the write up is the 4th of July weekend. Is this a hot news or a slow news time? If you picked “hot”, you are respectfully wrong.
Now back to “public.” Think in terms of Google’s licensing third-party data, cross correlating those data with its log data generated by users, and any proprietary data obtained by Google’s Android or Chrome software, Gmail, its office apps, and any other data which a user clicking one of those “Agree” boxes cheerfully mouses through.
The idea, if the information in Google patent US7774328 B2. What’s interesting is that this granted patent does not include a quite helpful figure from the patent application US2007 0198481. Here’s the 16 year old figure. The subject is Michael Jackson. The text is difficult to read (write your Congressman or Senator to complain). The output is a machine generated dossier about the pop star. Note that it includes aliases. Other useful data are in the report. The granted patent presents more vanilla versions of the dossier generator, however.
The use of “public” data may enhance the type of dossier or other meaty report about a person. How about a map showing the travels of a person prior to providing a geo-fence about an individual’s location on a specific day and time. Useful for some applications? If these “inventions” are real, then the potential use cases are interesting. Advertisers will probably be interested? Can you think of other use cases? I can.
The cited article focuses on AI. I think that more substantive use cases fit nicely with the shift in “policy” for public data. Have your asked yourself, “What will Mandiant professionals find interesting in cross correlated data?”
Stephen E Arnold, July 6, 2023
Quantum Seeks Succor Amidst the AI Tsunami
July 5, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
Imagine the heartbreak of a quantum wizard in the midst of the artificial intelligence tsunami. What can a “just around the corner” technology do to avoid being washed down the drain? The answer is public relations, media coverage, fascinating announcements. And what companies are practicing this dark art of outputting words instead of fully functional, ready-to-use solutions?
Give up?
I suggest that Google and IBM are the dominant players. Imagine an online ad outfit and a consulting firm with mainframes working overtime to make quantum computing exciting again. Frankly I am surprised that Intel has not climbed on its technology stallion and ridden Horse Ridge or Horse whatever into PR Land. But, hey, one has to take what one’s newsfeed delivers. The first 48 hours of July 2023 produced two interesting items.
The first is “Supercomputer Makes Calculations in Blink of an Eye That Take Rivals 47 Years.” The write up is about the Alphabet Google YouTube construct and asserts:
While the 2019 machine had 53 qubits, the building blocks of quantum computers, the next generation device has 70. Adding more qubits improves a quantum computer’s power exponentially, meaning the new machine is 241 million times more powerful than the 2019 machine. The researchers said it would take Frontier, the world’s leading supercomputer, 6.18 seconds to match a calculation from Google’s 53-qubit computer from 2019. In comparison, it would take 47.2 years to match its latest one. The researchers also claim that their latest quantum computer is more powerful than demonstrations from a Chinese lab which is seen as a leader in the field.
Can one see this fantastic machine which is 241 million times more powerful than the 2019 machine? Well, one can see a paper which talks about the machine. That is good enough for the Yahoo real news report. What do the Chinese, who have been kicked to the side of the Information Superhighway, say? Are you joking? That would be work. Writing about a Google paper and calling around is sufficient.
If you want to explore the source of this revelation, navigate to “Phase Transition in Random Circuit Sampling.” Note that the author has more than 175 authors is available from ArXiv.org at https://arxiv.org/abs/2304.11119. The list of authors does not appear in the PDF until page 37 (see below) and only about 80 appear on the abstract page on the ArXiv splash page. I scanned the list of authors and I did not see Jeff Dean’s name. Dr. Dean is/was a Big Dog at the Google but …
Just to make darned sure that Google’s Quantum Supremacy is recognized, the organizations paddling the AGY marketing stream include NASA, NIST, Harvard, and more than a dozen computing Merlins. So there! (Does AGY have an inferiority complex?)
The second quantum goody is the write up “IBM Unlocks Quantum Utility With its 127-Qubit “Eagle” Quantum Processing Unit.” The write up reports as actual factual IBM’s superior leap frogging quantum innovation; to wit, coping with noise and knowing if the results are accurate. The article says via a quote from an expert:
The crux of the work is that we can now use all 127 of Eagle’s qubits to run a pretty sizable and deep circuit — and the numbers come out correct
The write up explains:
The work done by IBM here has already had impact on the company’s [IBM’s] roadmap – ZNE has that appealing quality of making better qubits out of those we already can control within a Quantum Processing Unit (QPU). It’s almost as if we had a megahertz increase – more performance (less noise) without any additional logic. We can be sure these lessons are being considered and implemented wherever possible on the road to a “million + qubits”.
Can one access this new IBM approach? Well, there is this article and a chart.
Which quantum innovation is the more significant? In terms of putting the technology in one laptop, not much. Perhaps one can use the system via the cloud? Some may be able to get outputs… with permission of course.
But which is the PR winner? In my opinion, the Google wins because it presents a description of a concept with more authors. IBM, get your marketing in gear. By the way, what’s going on with the RedHat dust up? Quantum news releases won’t make that open source hassle go away. And, Google, the quantum stuff and the legion of authors is unlikely to impress European regulators.
And why make quantum noises before a US national holiday? My hunch is that quantum is perfect holiday fodder. My question, “When will the burgers be done?”
Stephen E Arnold, July 5, 2023
Step 1: Test AI Writing Stuff. Step 2: Terminate Humanoids. Will Outrage Prevent the Inevitable?
July 5, 2023
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Note: This essay is the work of a real and still-alive dinobaby. No smart software involved, just a dumb humanoid.
I am fascinated by the information (allegedly actual factual) in “Gizmodo and Kotaku Staff Furious After Owner Announces Move to AI Content.” Part of my interest is the subtitle:
God, this is gonna be such a f***ing nightmare.
Ah, for whom, pray tell. Probably not for the owners, who may see a pot of gold at the end of the smart software rainbow; for example, Costs Minus Humans Minus Health Care Minus HR Minus Miscellaneous Humanoid costs like latte makers, office space, and salaries / bonuses. What do these produce? More money (value) for the lucky most senior managers and selected stakeholders. Humanoids lose; software wins.
A humanoid writer sits at desk and wonders if the smart software will become a pet rock or a creature let loose to ruin her life by those who want a better payoff.
For the humanoids, it is hasta la vista. Assume the quality is worse? Then the analysis requires quantifying “worse.” Software will be cheaper over a time interval, expensive humans lose. Quality is like love and ethics. Money matters; quality becomes good enough.
Will, fury or outrage or protests make a difference? Nope.
The write up points out:
“AI content will not replace my work — but it will devalue it, place undue burden on editors, destroy the credibility of my outlet, and further frustrate our audience,” Gizmodo journalist Lin Codega tweeted in response to the news. “AI in any form, only undermines our mission, demoralizes our reporters, and degrades our audience’s trust.” “Hey! This sucks!” tweeted Kotaku writer Zack Zwiezen. “Please retweet and yell at G/O Media about this! Thanks.”
Much to the delight of her significant others, the “f***ing nightmare” is from the creative, imaginative humanoid Ashley Feinberg.
An ideal candidate for early replacement by a software system and a list of stop words.
Stephen E Arnold, July 5, 2023
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