Did Apple Buy Topsy for an Edge over Google
January 7, 2016
A couple years ago, Apple bought Topsy Labs, a social analytics firm and Twitter partner out of San Francisco. Now, in “Apple Inc. Acquired Topsy to Beat Google Search Capabilities,” BidnessEtc reports on revelations from Topsy’s former director of business development, Aaron Hayes-Roth. Writer Martin Blanc reveals:
“The startup’s tools were considered to be fast and reliable by the customers who used them. The in-depth analysis was smart enough to go back to 2006 and provide users with analytics and data for future forecasts. Mr. Roth and his team always had a curiosity attached to how Apple would use Twitter in its ecosystem. Apple does not make use of Twitter that much; the account was made in 2011 and there aren’t many tweets that come out of the social network. However, Mr. Roth explains that it was not Twitter data that Apple had its eye on; it was the technology that powered it. The architecture of Topsy makes it easier for systems to search large amounts of data extremely fast with impressive indexing capabilities. Subsequently, Apple’s ecosystem has developed quite a lot since Siri was first introduced with the iPhone 4s. The digital assistant and the Spotlight search are testament to how far Apple’s search capabilities have come.”
The article goes on to illustrate some of those advances, then points out the ongoing rivalry between Apple and Google. Are these improvements the result of Topsy’s tech? And will they give Apple the edge they need over their adversary? Stay tuned.
Cynthia Murrell, January 7, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
IBM and Yahoo Hard at Work on Real-Time Data Handling
January 7, 2016
The article titled What You Missed in Big Data: Real-time Intelligence on SiliconAngle speaks to the difficulties of handling the ever-increasing volumes of real-time data for corporations. Recently, IBM created supplementary stream process services including a machine learning engine that comes equipped with algorithm building capabilities. The algorithms aid in choosing relevant information from the numerous connected devices of a single business. The article explains,
“An electronics manufacturer, for instance, could use the service to immediately detect when a sensor embedded in an expensive piece of equipment signals a malfunction and automatically alert the nearest technician. IBM is touting the functionality as a way to cut through the massive volume of machine-generated signals produced every second in such environments, which can overburden not only analysts but also the technology infrastructure that supports their work.”
Yahoo has been working on just that issue, and lately open-sourced its engineers’ answer. In a demonstration to the press, the technology proved able to power through 100 million vales in under three seconds. Typically, such a high number would require two and a half minutes. The target of this sort of technology is measuring extreme numbers like visitor statistics. Accuracy takes a back seat to speed through estimation, but at such a speed it’s worth the sacrifice.
Chelsea Kerwin, January 7, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Sergey Brin Sells Alphabet Google Shares
January 6, 2016
I read “Insider Selling: Alphabet Inc (GOOG) Major Shareholder Sells $26,091,956.28 in Stock.” I noted these transactions summarized in the write up:
- On Tuesday, January 5th, [2016]Sergey Brin sold 33,340 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $753.62, for a total transaction of $25,125,690.80.
- On Monday, January 4th, [2016] Sergey Brin sold 33,332 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $745.36, for a total transaction of $24,844,339.52.
- On Thursday, December 31st, [2015]Sergey Brin sold 33,332 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $773.18, for a total transaction of $25,771,635.76.
- On Tuesday, December 29th, [2015] Sergey Brin sold 33,332 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $784.52, for a total transaction of $26,149,620.64.
Timing is everything my grandfather told me. Perhaps 2016 will be an interesting year for Google’s stock price?
Stephen E Arnold, January 6, 2016
IBM Watson Will See Soon
January 6, 2016
I read “Watson to Gain Ability to See with Planned $1B Acquisition of Merge Healthcare.” This mid 2015 deal will, according to the IBM announcement:
Watson will gain the ability to “see” by bringing together Watson’s advanced image analytics and cognitive capabilities with data and images obtained from Merge Healthcare Incorporated’s medical imaging management platform.
Interesting. IBM has a number of content management platforms; for example, FileNet. Reconciling the different types of images within Watson’s content intake system will keep some folks busy at Big Blue. The last diagnostic test I had generated a live stream of video images of various body parts chugging along. Movies!
Watson is a capable system, right?
Stephen E Arnold, January 6, 2016
Reverend Bayes: Still Making Headlines
January 6, 2016
Autonomy, now owned by Hewlett Packard Enterprise, was one of the first commercial search and content processing firms to embrace Bayesian methods. The approach in the 1990s was not as well known and as widely used as it is today. Part of the reason was the shroud of secrecy dropped over the method. Another factor was the skepticism some math folks had about the “judgment” factor required to set up Bayesian methods. That skepticism is still evident today even though Bayesian methods are used by many of the information processing outfits making headlines today.
A good example of the attitude appears in “Bayes’s Theorem: What’s the Big Deal?”
Here’s the quote I noted:
Embedded in Bayes’ theorem is a moral message: If you aren’t scrupulous in seeking alternative explanations for your evidence, the evidence will just confirm what you already believe. Scientists often fail to heed this dictum, which helps explains why so many scientific claims turn out to be erroneous. Bayesians claim that their methods can help scientists overcome confirmation bias and produce more reliable results, but I have my doubts.
Bayesian methods are just one of the most used methods in analytics outfits. Will these folks change methods? Nah.
Stephen E Arnold, January 6, 2015
Google Search and Cultural Representation
January 6, 2016
Google Search has worked its way into our culture as an indispensable, and unquestioned, tool of modern life. However, the algorithms behind the platform have become more sophisticated, allowing Google to tinker more and more with search results. Since so many of us regularly use the search engine to interact with the outside world, Google’s choices (and ours) affect the world’s perception of itself. Researcher Safiya Umoja Noble details some of the adverse effects of this great power in her paper, “Google Search: Hyper-Visibility as a Means of Rendering Black Women and Girls Invisible,” posted at the University of Rochester’s InVisible Culture journal. Not surprisingly, commerce features prominently in the story. Noble writes:
“Google’s algorithmic practices of biasing information toward the interests of the powerful elites in the United States,14 while at the same time presenting its results as generated from objective factors, has resulted in a provision of information that perpetuates the characterizations of women and girls through misogynist and pornified websites. Stated another way, it can be argued that Google functions in the interests of its most influential (i.e. moneyed) advertisers or through an intersection of popular and commercial interests. Yet Google’s users think of it as a public resource, generally free from commercial interest15—this fact likely bolstered by Google’s own posturing as a company for whom the informal mantra, ‘Don’t be evil,’ has functioned as its motivational core. Further complicating the ability to contextualize Google’s results is the power of its social hegemony.16 At the heart of the public’s general understanding and trust in commercial search engines like Google, is a belief in the neutrality of technology … which only obscures our ability to understand the potency of misrepresentation that further marginalizes and renders the interests of Black women, coded as girls, invisible.”
Noble goes on to note ways we, the users, codify our existing biases through our very interaction with Google Search. To say the paper treats these topic in depth is an understatement. Noble provides enough background on the study of culture’s treatment of Black women and girls to get any non-social-scientist up to speed. Then, she describes the extension of that treatment onto the Web, and how certain commercial enterprises now depend on those damaging representations. Finally, the paper calls for a critical approach to search to address these, and similar, issues. It is an important, and informative, paper; we suggest interested readers give it a gander.
Cynthia Murrell, January 6, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Magnetic Forensics Partners with In-Q-Tel to Battle Rising Cyber Crimes
January 6, 2016
The article on GCN titled In-Q-Tel Invests in Digital Forensics Firm discusses the recent addition of Magnetic Forensics to the In-Q-Tel investment portfolio. Digital forensics software is making large strides to improve the safety and security of data in a time when hackers seem unstoppable, and this is the area Magnetic Forensics’ applies expertise and innovation. In-Q-Tel is a technology investment firm that supports and coordinates with the CIA and Intelligence Community. The article explains,
Magnetic Forensics’ flagship product, Internet Evidence Finder, recovers unstructured data — such as social media, chat messages and e-mail from computers, smartphones and tablets — and structures the data for analysis and collaboration. It has been used by 2,700 public safety organizations in 92 counties to investigate cases related to cybercrime, terrorism, child exploitation and insider threats.
Given the almost daily reminders of the vulnerability of our data, investment in this sort of software is timely. Magnetic Forensics’ CEO Adam Belsher explained that IEF works by opening the pipeline of investigator workflow, organizing backlogs, and urgently absorbing the facts of the case to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the issue at hand. Additionally, the partnership will enhance In-Q-Tel’s existing product line while allowing for the creation of new resources for cyber security.
Chelsea Kerwin, January 6, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Search without Words: The ViSenze API
January 5, 2016
I read “GuangDa Li, Co-Founder and CTO ViSenze on Enabling Search without Key Words.” The article, I wish to point out, is written in words. To locate the article, one will have to use words to search for information about Dr. Li. Dragging his image to Google Images will not do the trick. The idea for search without words continues to attract attention. Ecommerce and law enforcement are keen to find alternatives to word centric queries. Searching for a text message with a particular emoji is not easy using words and phrases.
According to the write up:
In February 2013, GuangDa Li along with Oliver Tan, an industry veteran started ViSenze, a spin-off company from NExT, a research centre jointly established between National University of Singapore (NUS) and Tsinghua University of China. ViSenze has developed a technology that enables search without keywords. Users simply need to click a photo and ViSenze brings you the relevant search results based on that image.
The write up contains several points which I found interesting.
First, Mr. Li said:
Because of my background in internet media processing, I anticipated the change in the industry about 4 years ago – there was a sharp rise in the amount of multimedia content on the internet. The management, search and discovery of media content has become more and more demanding.
Image search is a challenge. Once promising systems to query video like Exalead’s system have dropped from public view. Video search on most services is frustrating.
Second, the business model for ViSenze is API focused. Mr. Li said:
ViSearch Search API is our flagship product and it also serves as the fundamentals for our other vertical applications. The key advantage of ViSearch API is that it is a perfect combination of latency, scalability and accuracy.
The third passage of interest to me was:
We used to be in stealth mode for a while. Only after our API was launched on the Rakuten Taiwan Ichiba website, did we start to talk with investors. It just happened.
I interpreted this to suggest that Rakuten recognizes that traditional eCommerce search systems like Amazon are vulnerable to a different information access approach.
Should Amazon worry about Rakuten or regulators? Amazon does not worry about much it seems. Its core search and cloud based search systems are, in my view, old school and frustrating for some users. Maybe ViSenze will offer a way to deliver a more effective solution for Rakuten. Competition might motive Amazon to do a better job with its own search and retrieval systems.
Stephen E Arnold, January 5, 2016
Dark Web and Tor Investigative Tools Webinar
January 5, 2016
Telestrategies announced on January 4, 2016, a new webinar for active LEA and intel professionals. The one hour program is focused on tactics, new products, and ongoing developments for Dark Web and Tor investigations. The program is designed to provide an overview of public, open source, and commercial systems and products. These systems may be used as standalone tools or integrated with IBM i2 ANB or Palantir Gotham. More information about the program is available from Telestrategies. There is no charge for the program. In 2016, Stephen E Arnold’s new Dark Web Notebook will be published. More information about the new monograph upon which the webinar is based may be obtained by writing benkent2020 at yahoo dot com.
Stephen E Arnold, January 5, 2016
Search Engine for Children? Thinga
January 5, 2016
Short honk: Nervous about your child navigating to Yandex.com and entering a harmless query such as Czech auditions? No worries. Point them at Thinga. For information about about child-friendly search engine, get the details from “Thinga Is a Search Engine Designed for Kids.” Here’s the passage I highlighted:
Thinga has built its own content library that have been hand picked by Heinley’s team or pulled from websites that have been white listed and are kid-friendly, so basically if it isn’t inside their database, then kids won’t be able to search for it. The downside is that we suppose at the start, search results might be a little bit limited but we expect that over time it will grow.
This sounds a bit like The Point (Top 5% of the Internet) which was available in 1993 and then acquired by Lycos. It is useful to know that good ideas come and go. A smile to the Point team and Chris Kitze too. Thinga uses a different business model from our ad driven system. What is that angle? Ecommerce and maybe a printed magazine.
Stephen E Arnold, January 5, 2016
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