Is Google Biotech Team Overreaching?
September 9, 2016
Science reality is often inspired by science fiction, and Google’s biotech research division, Verily Life Sciences, is no exception. Business Insider posts, “‘Silicon Valley Arrogance’? Google Misfires as It Strives to Turn Star Trek Fiction Into Reality.” The “Star Trek” reference points to Verily’s Tricorder project, announced three years ago, which set out to create a cancer-early-detection device. Sadly, that hopeful venture may be sputtering out. STAT reporter Charles Piller writes:
Recently departed employees said the prototype didn’t work as hoped, and the Tricorder project is floundering. Tricorder is not the only misfire for Google’s ambitious and extravagantly funded biotech venture, now named Verily Life Sciences. It has announced three signature projects meant to transform medicine, and a STAT examination found that all of them are plagued by serious, if not fatal, scientific shortcomings, even as Verily has vigorously promoted their promise.
Piller cites two projects, besides the Tricorder, that underwhelm. We’re told that independent experts are dubious about the development of a smart contact lens that can detect glucose levels for diabetics. Then there is the very expensive Baseline study—an attempt to define what it means to be healthy and to catch diseases earlier—which critics call “lofty” and “far-fetched.” Not surprisingly, Google being Google, there are also some privacy concerns being raised about the data being collected to feed the study.
There are several criticisms and specific examples in the lengthy article, and interested readers should check it out. There seems to be one central notion, though— that Verily Live Sciences is attempting to approach the human body like a computer when medicine is much, much more complicated than that. The impressive roster of medical researchers on the team seems to provide little solace to critics. The write-up relates:
It’s axiomatic in Silicon Valley’s tech companies that if the math and the coding can be done, the product can be made. But seven former Verily employees said the company’s leadership often seems not to grasp the reality that biology can be more complex and less predictable than computers. They said Conrad, who has a PhD in anatomy and cell biology, applies the confident impatience of computer engineering, along with extravagant hype, to biotech ideas that demand rigorous peer review and years or decades of painstaking work.
Are former employees the most objective source? I suspect ex-Googlers and third-party scientists are underestimating Google. The company has a history of reaching the moon by shooting for the stars, and for enduring a few failures as a price of success. I would not be surprised to see Google emerge on top of the biotech field. (As sci fi fans know, biotech is the medicine of the future. You’ll see.) The real question is how the company will treat privacy, data rights, and patient safety along the way.
Cynthia Murrell, September 9, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
Weekly Watson: IBM Watson Plays Tennis
September 8, 2016
My recollection is that IBM has provided a range of services to various sporting activities. I did not know that IBM Watson could serve, volley, and deal with love. Advantages, yes. Love, not so much. I learned that IBM Watson will be attending the US Open in “IBM Watson’s Next Match? The U.S. Open.” The story appeared on USA Today’s Web site along with a number of compelling pop up pleas for me to subscribe to the dead tree version of the Gannet newspaper. Err, no thanks.
I learned:
IBM has collaborated with the United State Tennis Association on technology for more than a quarter-century, but Watson, IBM’s self-proclaimed cognitive computer, is a newbie at the Open. IBM is leveraging Watson’s machine learning smarts and cloud-based analytics to try and bolster the fan experience during the tournament–while simultaneously raising Watson’s profile.
Just imagine. IBM is trying to raise Watson’s profile.
I highlighted another knowledge nugget from the McPaper online write up; namely:
Behind the scenes at the U.S. Open, Watson’s speech-to-text technology is “listening” to interviews with players and video clips of tennis action to generate transcripts and subtitles for videos published to the tournament’s website and other digital platforms.
I have always wondered if squeaky clean female tennis players from Eastern Europe cursed on court after losing a point. Perhaps Watson will monitor, translate, and display what real players say in natural language.
Even more interesting, USA Today revealed:
Through Watson’s natural language capabilities, fans can use the artificial intelligence-infused U.S. Open mobile app to ask such questions as, “Where can I get a hamburger?” or “Where are the bathrooms?”
Right. The facilities’ question. The crack journalism outfit was not, it appears, swept game, set and match by Watson.
I noted this statement:
I consider this one to be a fault.
Clever. The fault referenced informed McPaper that its social media alter ego was Pamela Anderson. Does Ms. Anderson play a vigorous game of tennis?
Stephen E Arnold, September 8, 2016
Enterprise Search: Pool Party and Philosophy 101
September 8, 2016
I noted this catchphrase: “An enterprise without a semantic layer is like a country without a map.” I immediately thought of this statement made by Polish-American scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski:
The map is not the territory.
When I think about enterprise search, I am thrilled to have an opportunity to do the type of thinking demanded in my college class in philosophy and logic. Great fun. I am confident that any procurement team will be invigorated by an animated discussion about representations of reality.
I did a bit of digging and located “Introducing a Graph-based Semantic Layer in Enterprises” as the source of the “country without a map” statement.
What is interesting about the article is that the payload appears at the end of the write up. The magic of information representation as a way to make enterprise search finally work is technology from a company called Pool Party.
Pool Party describes itself this way:
Pool Party is a semantic technology platform developed, owned and licensed by the Semantic Web Company. The company is also involved in international R&D projects, which continuously impact the product development. The EU-based company has been a pioneer in the Semantic Web for over a decade.
From my reading of the article and the company’s marketing collateral it strikes me that this is a 12 year old semantic software and consulting company.
The idea is that there is a pool of structured and unstructured information. The company performs content processing and offers such features as:
- Taxonomy editor and maintenance
- A controlled vocabulary management component
- An audit trail to see who changed what and when
- Link analysis
- User role management
- Workflows.
The write up with the catchphrase provides an informational foundation for the company’s semantic approach to enterprise search and retrieval; for example, the company’s four layered architecture:
The base is the content layer. There is a metadata layer which in Harrod’s Creek is called “indexing”. There is the “semantic layer”. At the top is the interface layer. The “semantic” layer seems to be the secret sauce in the recipe for information access. The phrase used to describe the value added content processing is “semantic knowledge graphs.” These, according to the article:
let you find out unknown linkages or even non-obvious patterns to give you new insights into your data.
The system performs entity extraction, supports custom ontologies (a concept designed to make subject matter experts quiver), text analysis, and “graph search.”
Graph search is, according to the company’s Web site:
Semantic search at the highest level: Pool Party Graph Search Server combines the power of graph databases and SPARQL engines with features of ‘traditional’ search engines. Document search and visual analytics: Benefit from additional insights through interactive visualizations of reports and search results derived from your data lake by executing sophisticated SPARQL queries.
To make this more clear, the company offers a number of videos via YouTube.
The idea reminded us of the approach taken in BAE NetReveal and Palantir Gotham products.
Pool Party emphasizes, as does Palantir, that humans play an important role in the system. Instead of “augmented intelligence,” the article describes the approach methods which “combine machine learning and human intelligence.”
The company’s annual growth rate is more than 20 percent. The firm has customers in more than 20 countries. Customers include Pearson, Credit Suisse, the European Commission, Springer Nature, Wolters Kluwer, and the World Bank and “many other customers.” The firm’s projected “Euro R&D project volume” is 17 million (although I am not sure what this 17,000,000 number means. The company’s partners include Accenture, Complexible, Digirati, and EPAM, among others.
I noted that the company uses the catchphrase: “Semantic Web Company” and the catchphrase “Linking data to knowledge.”
The catchphrase, I assume, make it easier for some to understand the firm’s graph based semantic approach. I am still mired in figuring out that the map is not the territory.
Stephen E Arnold, September 8, 2016
Cairo Authorities Perform Bitcoin Sting
September 8, 2016
Egyptian authorities refuse to let a 30-year-old dentist get away with trading in digital currency, despite there being no law on the books to prohibit the practice. The Merkle informs us, “Egyptian Dentist Apprehended in Bitcoin Sting Operation in Cairo.” Reporter Traderman reveals:
According to today’s post on the facebook page of The Ministry of the Interior, Mr. Ahmed was captured with $13,900 in cash, as well as a cellular phone and a smart tablet that were used in the trading operation. Authorities setup Ahmed by contacting him about a potential deal on LocalBitcoins, where Ahmed was selling the digital currency for $570 per coin.
The investigation was carried out with the cooperation of the Cairo Department of Public Safety and the Cairo Security Directorate. Mr. Ahmed has apparently confessed to trading bitcoin, but it is unclear what specific law Mr. Ahmed was breaking, as there are no regulations on digital currencies in Egypt.
The write-up tells us manufacturer AMECO, based in Cairo, has been accepting bitcoin apparently unmolested since 2014. Traderman also notes that, as of their writing, about seven Egyptian bitcoin vendors operating on LocalBitcoins, all of whom seem to be running modest operations. It will be interesting to see whether law-enforcement continues to crack down on bitcoin within their borders, and, if so, what justification authorities may offer. Perhaps they will go so far as to pass a law.
Cynthia Murrell, September 8, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
A Snapchat Is Worth a Thousand Twitter Characters or More
September 8, 2016
The article titled Snapchat Passes Twitter in Daily Usage on Bloomberg Technology provides some insights into the most popular modes of communication. As the title suggests, that mode is not with words. Rather, 150 million people appear to prefer images to language, at least when it comes to engaging with other on social media. The article reveals,
Snapchat has made communicating more of a game by letting people send annotated selfies and short videos. It has allowed people to use its imaging software to swap faces in a photo, transform themselves into puppies, and barf rainbows… Snapchat encourages people to visit the app frequently with features such as the “Snapstreak,” which counts the number of consecutive days they’ve been communicating with their closest friends. Snapchat’s other content, such as news and Live Stories, disappear after 24 hours.
Other Silicon Valley players have taken note of this trend. Facebook recently purchased the company that built Masquerade, an app offering photo-manipulation akin to Snapchat’s. Are words on their way out? The trend of using abbreviations (“abbrevs”) and slang to streamline messaging would logically result in a replacement of language with images, which can say volumes with a single click. But this could also result in a lot of confusion and miscommunication. Words allow for a precision of meaning that images often can’t supply. Hence the crossbreed of a short note scrawled across an image.
Chelsea Kerwin, September 8, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
Hewlett Packard: About Face
September 7, 2016
I read “Exclusive: HP Enterprise in Talks to Sell Software Unit to Thoma Bravo – Sources.” Who does not love a news story labeled “exclusive” and attributed to “sources” when the subject is Hewlett Packard Enterprise? The thrust of the story is that HPE, fresh from making marketing noises about its enterprise software business, is allegedly selling those software businesses.
Let’s assume that this is indeed accurate. The asking price is is in the neighborhood of $8 to $10 billion or more if the excited buyer really wants this collection of software.
Why is HPE selling what it has been working hard to craft into a sustainable revenue stream with healthy profit margins? The write up reports:
HPE’s software unit generated $3.6 billion in net revenue in 2015, down from $3.9 billion in 2014. The company has said revenue growth in its software unit has been challenged by a market shift toward cloud subscription offerings.
Yep, these numbers will drive potential buyers into a frenzy.
The word in Harrod’s Creek, Kentucky, is that HPE is eager to find a way to make money, boost the company’s value to shareholders, and plug into to the fluffy cloud opportunities. HPE’s present software may not be the answer for HPE. Another outfit should be able to release a flood of revenue.
One of the goslings (un-named, of course) thought that HPE was going cold turkey to kick its Autonomy habit. The shadow of the search business makes life chilly for the would be technology leader. In an “exclusive” comment to Beyond Search, HPE anticipates victory in its legal flap associated with the purchase of Autonomy for an modest $10 or $11 billion.
We don’t know if our un-named gosling is on the right track, but if HPE sells Autonomy and other assorted gems from its software vault, the difference between what HPE paid for Autonomy and then the amount generated by the sale of Autonomy is only a couple billion dollars.
What’s a few billion dollars for a focused, consistent, well managed outfit like HPE? A pittance I say.
I wonder, “Does the buyer of HPE’s Autonomy-infused bundle recognize the excitement selling search and retrieval will engender?” Sure. These are savvy folks. Generating revenue from proprietary search and content processing software is really easy.
If Google can do, anyone can, right? Oh, Google closed its enterprise search product. Well, what about Palantir? Oh, Palantir relies on open source for findability functions. How about IBM? Oh, shucks, IBM relies on Lucene with home brew code and acquired technology.
As I said, search is easy.
Stephen E Arnold, September 7, 2016
The DNA of AT&T: The Bell Tolls for Google Fiber
September 7, 2016
In the great chain of telecommunications, AT&T (aka Ma Bell) sat at the top of the food chain. Today the DNA of the original Ma Bell lives on its chubby Baby Bell progeny, Verizon and the former Pioneer Telephone and Telegraph Company of Oklahoma along with a few other properties like Southwestern Bell.
I read an interesting blog post which I am confident was reviewed by at least one legal eagle, perhaps as many as several dozen. One cannot be too careful, which is one of the twisted copper pair truisms. Those with the sprit of the Young Pioneers are essentially conservative, preferring old fashioned Edison inspired virtues: Kindness, patience, courtly behavior, etc., etc.
“Broadband Investment: Not for the Faint of Heart” essentially pats Google on the head and says, “Nice try, kids.” The Alphabet Google thing bought some fiber optic long lines. The Alphabet Google thing wanted to use its fiber to become a reinvigorated version of Ma Bell. Sure, wireless is an interesting technology, the Google apparently assumed that old school infrastructure was not particularly challenging. I recall one Google presentation in which a pizza delivery vehicle was a mobile hot spot. Despite that awareness of wireless, the AT&T write up points out that old school phone work is different from selling ads to users of an online search engine. But the fiber thing and the wireless thing combined may be as tricky a problem to solve as death. Alphabet Google’s X Labs bet is that immortality is within reach. Perhaps mind uploading via Google fiber will do the trick for some Googlers. Sounds more digital than cyonics, which reminds me of my mother’s freezer filled with frost covered packages of mystery food.
I highlighted this passage:
Building reliable, ubiquitous high-speed broadband connectivity is tough. It takes an enormous commitment of capital and resources and a highly-skilled and capable work force. Yet AT&T has been at it for over 140 years. Between 2011 and 2015, while Google Fiber was cutting its teeth on fiber, AT&T invested over $140B in its network, building to over one million route miles of fiber globally and deploying ultra-high-speed fiber-fed GigaPower broadband services, reaching over a hundred cities. Along the way, AT&T spent over $13B with minority, women and disabled veteran-owned suppliers in 2015 alone.
I formulated several questions based on this excellent write up. (Full disclosure. Gentle reader, I was a contractor to Bell Labs and then to Bellcore for a number of years.)
- Does Google understand the nature of the put down AT&T presents in the blog post?
- Does Google accept the fact that the DNA of AT&T and Verizon spawn powerful antigens. These antigens may not make the Alphabet Google life form live without some troublesome outbreaks of psoriasis or worse?
- Does Google care what an old fashioned outfit based on physical switches, tubes, and low bandwidth copper thinks, says, or does?
I will leave you to ponder these issues. In the meantime, the disruptive forces of the Alphabet Google thing seem not to trouble what seems to be a tough, gritty, and resilient Ma Bell. I think in Harrod’s Creek we visualize Ma Bell with a chewed, unlit cigar clenched in her teeth. But we can confuse Ma Kettle with Ma Bell.
Stephen E Arnold, September 7, 2016
Revolving Door Hires at Google
September 7, 2016
It looks like Google has determined the best way to address its legal challenges in Europe is to infiltrate and influence its governments. The Guardian reports, “Google: New Concerns Raised About Political Influence by Senior ‘Revolving Door’ Jobs.” The personnel-based tactic has apparently worked so well in the U.S. that Google is applying it to the European arena. Writer Jamie Doward cites research by the the Google Transparency Project, a venture of the Campaign for Accountability (CfA), when she writes:
New concerns have been raised about the political influence of Google after research found at least 80 ‘revolving door’ moves in the past decade – instances where the online giant took on government employees and European governments employed Google staff. … The CfA has suggested that the moves are a result of Google seeking to boost its influence in Europe as the company seeks to head off antitrust action and moves to tighten up on online privacy.
The article gets into specifics on who was hired where and when; navigate to it for those details. In sum, Doward writes:
Overall, the research suggests that Google, now part of parent company Alphabet Inc, has hired at least 65 former government officials from within the European Union since 2005.
During the same period, 15 Google employees were appointed to government positions in Europe, gaining what the CfA claims are ‘valuable contacts at the heart of the decision-making process’.
Anne Weisemann, CfA executive director, points to Google’s success influencing the U.S. government as a driving factor in its EU choices. She notes Google spends more to lobby our federal government than any other company, and that Google execs grace the White House more than once a week, on average. Also, CfA points to more than 250 of these “revolving door” appointments Google has made in the U.S.
For its part, Google claims it is just hiring experts who can answer government officials’ many questions about the Internet, about their own business model, and the “opportunity for European businesses to grow online.” There’s no way that could give Google an unfair advantage, right?
The article concludes with a call to reevaluate how government officials view Google—it is now much more than a search engine, it is a major political actor. Caution is warranted as the company works its way into government-run programs like the UK’s National Health Service and school systems. Such choices, ones that can affect the public on a grand scale, should be fully informed. Listening to Google lobbyists, who excel at playing on politicians’ technical ignorance, does not count.
Cynthia Murrell, September 7, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
Big Data Processing Is Relative to Paradigm of Today
September 7, 2016
The size and volume that characterizes an information set as big data — and the tools used to process — is relative to the current era. A story from NPR reminds us of this as they ask, Can Web Search Predict Cancer? Promise And Worry Of Big Data And Health. In 1600’s England, a statistician essentially founded demography by compiling details of death records into tables. Today, trends from big data are drawn through a combination of assistance from computer technology and people’s analytical skills. Microsoft scientists conducted a study showing that Bing search queries may hold clues to a future diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.
The Microsoft scientists themselves acknowledge this [lack of comprehensive knowledge and predictive abilities] in the study. “Clinical trials are necessary to understand whether our learned model has practical utility, including in combination with other screening methods,” they write. Therein lies the crux of this big data future: It’s a logical progression for the modern hyper-connected world, but one that will continue to require the solid grounding of a traditional health professional, to steer data toward usefulness, to avoid unwarranted anxiety or even unnecessary testing, and to zero in on actual causes, not just correlations within particular health trends.”
As the producers of data points in many social-related data sets, and as the original analyzers of big data, it makes sense that people remain a key part of big data analytics. While this may be especially pertinent in matters related to health, it may be more intuitively understood in this sector in contrast to others. Whether health or another sector, can the human variable ever be taken out of the data equation? Perhaps such a world will give rise to whatever is beyond the current buzz around the phrase big data.
Megan Feil, September 7, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
HonkinNews for September 6, 2016, Now Available
September 6, 2016
If you visit Zimbabwe, what risks do you face when you use Facebook? Is the CIA’s investment arm too secretive? Whom do you consult to get the inside scoop about legacy code running on the mainframe in the basement? For the answers to these questions, invest six minutes in the September 6, 2016, edition of HonkinNews, a round up of stories from Beyond Search. You can view this week’s program at this link or click on the embedded viewer on the Beyond Search blog.
Kenny Toth, September 6, 2016
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