Apple, Google Make it Easier for States to Adopt Virus Tracing App
September 12, 2020
Google and Apple created an app that would, with the cooperation of state governments, aid in tracing the spread of the coronavirus and notify citizens if they spent time around someone known to have tested positive. It is nice to see these rivals working together for the common good. So far, though, only a few states have adopted the technology. In order to encourage more states to join in, AP News reveals, “Apple, Google Build Virus-Tracing Tech Directly into Phones.” Reporter Matt O’Brien writes:
“Apple and Google are trying to get more U.S. states to adopt their phone-based approach for tracing and curbing the spread of the coronavirus by building more of the necessary technology directly into phone software. That could make it much easier for people to get the tool on their phone even if their local public health agency hasn’t built its own compatible app. The tech giants on Tuesday launched the second phase of their ‘exposure notification’ system, designed to automatically alert people if they might have been exposed to the coronavirus. Until now, only a handful of U.S. states have built pandemic apps using the tech companies’ framework, which has seen somewhat wider adoption in Europe and other parts of the world.”
In states that do adopt the system, iPhone users will be prompted for consent to run it on their phones. Android users will have to download the app, which Google will auto-generate for each public health agency that participates. Early adopters are expected to be Maryland, Nevada, Virginia, and Washington D.C. Virginia was the first to use the framework to launch a customized app in early August, followed by North Dakota, Wyoming, Alabama, and Nevada. O’Brien describes how it works:
“The technology relies on Bluetooth wireless signals to determine whether an individual has spent time near anyone else who has tested positive for the virus. Both people in this scenario must have signed up to use the Google-Apple technology. Instead of geographic location, the app relies on proximity. The companies say the app won’t reveal personal information either to them or public health officials.”
This all sounds helpful. However, the world being what it is today, we must ask: does this have surveillance applications? Perhaps. Note we’re promised the app won’t “reveal” personal data, but will it retain it? If it does, will agencies be able to resist this big, juicy pile of data? Promises about surveillance have a way of being broken, after all.
Cynthia Murrell, September 12, 2020
Help the Duo, Obi-Wan. The Future Is Here
September 11, 2020
I read “Surface Duo Is Packed with Power and Bugs.” If you want to locate the story online, you will need to search for “Microsoft Surface Duo Review: Two Screens, Too Many Problems.” Why? “Because Murdoch.” Did you have to ask?
The key point of this short item is to point to the title of Matt Barlow. Now the good part. His title allegedly is:
corporate vice president of modern life, search and devices.
Okay, modern life is replete with buggy Windows 10 updates, the pandemic, financial turmoil for non-monopolistically inclined enterprises, and social unrest. The search thing is a bit of a joke. We need Elizabeth Barrett Browning to count the number of ways to “search” using Microsoft applications and solutions. (How about that Excel and Dynamics search by the way?)
Now jump to the ultimate paragraph in the write up which says:
I’m hungry for the real power and productivity promised by this future feeling gadget. It just has to actually work.
The hunger is a trope related to the ill-cooked steak. The split infinitive is the new “real” journalism. Gritty.
The point, however, is probably one Microsoft’s corporate vice president of modern life, search, and videos would prefer to delete. Yeah, that’s the reminder that Microsoft outputs have to work actually.
Actually?
Stephen E Arnold, September 11, 2020
Amazon and Halliburton: A Tie Up to Watch? Yep
September 11, 2020
DarkCyber noted “Explor, Halliburton, AWS Collaborate to Achieve Breakthrough with Seismic Data Processing in the Cloud.” The write up explains that crunching massive seismic data sets works. Among the benchmarks reported by the online bookstore and the environmentally-aware engineering and services companies are:
- An 85% decrease in CDP sort order times: Tested by sorting 308 million traces comprising of 1.72 TB from shot domain to CDP domain, completing the flow in an hour.
- An 88% decrease in CDP FK Filtering times: Tested with a 57 million-trace subset of the data comprising 318 GB, completing the flow in less than 6 minutes.
- An 82% decrease in pre-stack time migration times: Tested on the full 165 million-trace dataset comprising of 922GB, completing the flow in 54 minutes.
What do these data suggest? Better, faster, and cheaper processing?
We noted this paragraph in the write up:
“The collaboration with AWS and Explor demonstrates the power of digital investments that Halliburton is making, in this instance to bring high-density surveys to market faster and more economically than ever before. By working with industry thought leaders like Explor and AWS, we have been able to demonstrate that digital transformation can deliver step-change improvements in the seismic processing market.” – Philip Norlund, Geophysics Domain Manager, Halliburton, Landmark
Keep in mind that these data are slightly more difficult to manipulate than a couple hundred thousand tweets.
Stephen E Arnold, September 11, 2020
Palantir: Will Investors Embrace Intelware Outfit Generating Consistent, Substantial Losses for More Than a Decade?
September 11, 2020
The stock market is chugging along, fueled by greed, the Rona, and a need to fuel the 21st-century F. Scott Fitzgerald gestalt. “Palantir Is Being Valued around $10.5 billion ahead of Direct Listing as Investors Question Growth Story” includes some interesting information about Palantir, an intelware startup which is only 17 years old, losing money, and shrouded in mysterious behavior.
The write up states:
Palantir said in its updated prospectus on Wednesday that it has 1.64 billion shares outstanding, as of Sept. 1 [2020]. Based on the average private market transaction price in the latest quarter of $6.45 a share, the company is being valued by investors at just over $10.5 billion. That’s far below Palantir’s valuation of $20.4 billion in a 2015 funding round.
Is “far below” a signal?
The write up notes:
In July, Palantir raised $410.5 million by selling shares at $4.75 a piece, according to the filing, which comes out to a valuation of about $7.8 billion. Transactions during the quarter took place at anywhere from $4.17 a share to $11.50 a share, suggesting a range of $6.83 billion to $18.8 billion. The math gets even fuzzier when considering that Palantir had a reported valuation of $20.4 billion in 2015, when the share price was $11.38. That price, based on the supplied share count as of Sept. 1, would indicate a current valuation of $18.6 billion.
Interesting.
But the losses need to be viewed differently; for example:
Palantir wants investors to concentrate on what the company calls its contribution margin, or the revenue left after subtracting the costs it bears to generate sales. That number climbed to 55% in the second quarter from 18% a year earlier.
I don’t recall “contribution margin” from my economics class in 1962.
The write up points out:
Palantir has only 125 customers that spent on average $5.6 million each in 2019. Glazer says the company’s products and sales strategies are “in their infancies.”
DarkCyber believes that Palantir’s trajectory over the last decade makes clear that there is a glass ceiling for software and services centric solutions. If our data are semi-accurate, Palantir is unlikely to grow in a way to repay its investors or achieve profitability in a highly competitive market sector.
Interesting play in the time of Rona, constrained budgets in government agencies, and a hint of financial desperation in some allied sectors.
Stephen E Arnold, September 11, 2020
The Ideal Internet: Point of View Is Important
September 11, 2020
I read “Now the Impact of Regulation on the Internet Can Be Gauged.” Interesting but fanciful, the article lays out what the Internet should be. The main points appear to exist in a mental construct removed from political turmoil, the Rona, and financial challenges.
The write up explains that the Internet Society has crafted an Internet Impact Assessment Toolkit. I learned that the:
Internet Way of Networking (IWN): Defining the Critical Properties of the Internet, … explains how the Internet’s unique foundation is responsible for its strength and success. It also identifies the critical properties that must be protected to enable the Internet to reach its full potential….The Internet Impact Assessment Toolkit is a guide to help ensure regulation, technology trends and decisions don’t harm the infrastructure of the Internet.
Here are the key elements of the IWN:
- An accessible infrastructure with a common protocol – A ‘common language’ enabling global connectivity and unrestricted access to the Internet.
- An open architecture of interoperable and reusable building blocks – Open infrastructure with a set of standards enabling permission-free innovation.
- Decentralized management and a single distributed routing system – Distributed routing enabling local networks to grow, while maintaining worldwide connectivity.
- Common global identifiers – A single common identifier allowing computers and devices around the world to communicate with each other.
- A technology-neutral, general-purpose network – A simple and adaptable dynamic environment cultivating infinite opportunities for innovation.
Quite idealistic, and the statements do not address the reality of corrosive social networks and the emergence of corporate nation states. And there’s China. Oh, right, China.
Stephen E Arnold, September 11, 2020
Making Search Fair: An Interesting Idea
September 11, 2020
Search rankings on Google, Bing, and various other search engines have not been fair for years. SEO tricks fall flatter than a pancake and the best way to get to the top of Google search results is with ads. The only thing Google does that is somewhat decent is that it marks paid ads in search results. EurekAlert! shares that there is a “New Tool Improves Fairness Of Online Search Rankings.”
Cornell University researchers developed a new tool, FairCo, that improves the fairness of online rankings that does not sacrifice relevance or usefulness. The idea behind the tool was that users only look at the first page of search results and miss other relevant results. This otherwise creates bias in the results. FairCo works similar to making a decision when you have all the facts:
“ ‘If you could examine all your choices equally and then decide what to pick, that may be considered ideal. But since we can’t do that, rankings become a crucial interface to navigate these choices,’ said computer science doctoral student Ashudeep Singh, co-first author of “Controlling Fairness and Bias in Dynamic Learning-to-Rank,” which won the Best Paper Award at the Association for Computing Machinery SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval. ‘For example, many YouTubers will post videos of the same recipe, but some of them get seen way more than others, even though they might be very similar,” Singh said. “And this happens because of the way search results are presented to us. We generally go down the ranking linearly and our attention drops off fast.’”
FairCo is supposed to give the same exposure to all results from a search and ignores preferential treatment. This eliminates the unfairness in current search algorithms which are notorious for being biased.
With the amount of biased media outlets and disinformation spreading across the Internet and social media platforms, FairCo could help eliminate this problem. The problem would be getting large companies like Google and Facebook to adopt the tool, but if Cornell researchers received an injection of Google or Facebook money to expand FairCo it might work. However, paid ads always trump search results.
Whitney Grace, September 11, 2020
Amazon: Nope, We Do Not Have an Interest in Intelware
September 10, 2020
A number of individuals have informed me that Amazon has zero interest in what I call “intelware.” The term refers to services, features, and information products designed to meet the needs of certain government agencies. These individuals are convinced that Amazon sells online books and discounted wireless headphones.
I would point out that there are some who do not accept this denial. One example appears in the “real news” outfit The Verge’s article titled “Former NSA Chief Keith Alexander Has Joined Amazon’s Board of Directors.” General Alexander is a capable individual, and he can share his experience and wisdom to refine the process of selling electric toothbrushes and other fungible oddments. After retiring, he founded IronNet Cybersecurity. Kindles can never be too secure.
As for intelware, Amazon is not in that business. At least, that’s what I have been told. Are there challenges beyond JEDI? Obviously not.
Stephen E Arnold, September 10, 2020
Surveillance Footage Has Value
September 10, 2020
It is not a secret that Google, Facebook, Apple, Instagram, and other large technology companies gather user data and sell it to the highest bidder. It is a easy way to pad their bottom line, especially when users freely give away this information. The Russian city of Moscow wants to ad more revenue to the city’s coffers, so they came up with an ingenious way to get more cash says Yahoo Finance, “Moscow May Sell Footage From Public Secret Camera: Report.”
According to the report, Moscow’s tech branch plans to broadcast videos captured on cameras in public areas. Technically, at least within the United States, if you are in a public place you are free to be filmed and whoever does the filming can do whatever they want with the footage. Russia must be acting on the same principle, so Moscow’s Department of Information Technologies purchased cameras to install outside of 539 hospitals. It might also be a way to increase security.
All of the footage will be stored on a central database and people will be able to purchase footage. The footage will also be shown on the Internet.
What is alarming is that MBK Media wrote in December 2019 that footage from Moscow’s street cameras was available for purchase on black markets with options to access individual or an entire system of cameras. This fact is scarier, however:
“The same department organized the blockchain-based electronic voting in Moscow and one more Russian region this summer when Russians voted to amend the country’s constitution. The voting process was criticized for the weak data protection.”
Moscow wants more ways to keep track of citizens in public areas and it wants to make some quick rubles off the process. Companies in the US do the same thing and the government as well.
Whitney Grace, September 10, 2020
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Science: Just Delete It
September 10, 2020
The information in “Dozens of Scientific Journals Have Vanished from the Internet, and No One Preserved Them” may remind some people that the “world’s information” and the “Internet archives” are marketing sizzle. The steak is the source document. The FBI has used the phrase “going dark” as shorthand for not being able to access certain information. The thrill of not have potentially useful information is one that most researchers prefer to reserve for thrill rides at Legoland.
The write up states:
Eighty-four online-only, open-access (OA) journals in the sciences, and nearly 100 more in the social sciences and humanities, have disappeared from the internet over the past 2 decades as publishers stopped maintaining them, potentially depriving scholars of useful research findings, a study has found. An additional 900 journals published only online also may be at risk of vanishing because they are inactive, says a preprint posted on 3 September on the arXiv server. The number of OA journals tripled from 2009 to 2019, and on average the vanished titles operated for nearly 10 years before going dark, which “might imply that a large number … is yet to vanish…
Flat earthers and those who believe that “just being” is a substitute for academic rigor are probably going to have “thank goodness, these documents are gone” party. I won’t be attending.
Anti-intellectualism is really exciting. Plus, it makes life a lot easier for those in the top one percent of intellectual capability. Why? Extensive reading can fill in some blanks. Who wants to be comprehensive? Oh, I know: “Those who consume TikTok videos and devour Instagram while checking WhatsApp messages.”
Stephen E Arnold, September 10, 2020
IBM, Canned Noise, but No Moan from the Injured Line Judge: IBM Watson, What Is Happening?
September 10, 2020
As it has done since 2015, IBM has shared details about the AI tech it is using to support the US Open tennis championship. This year’s tournament, though, is different from most due to the pandemic. VentureBeat reports, “IBM Will Use AI to Pipe in Simulated Crowd Noise During the U.S. Open.” We think IBM is making the project more complicated than necessary. A sound bed can be accomplished with sound snips on a laptop. Need sound, click a link. IBM’s solution? Bring an F 35, its support team, and a truck filled with spares. Writer Kyle Wiggers reports:
“The first [addition] is AI Sounds, which aims to recreate the ambient noise normally emanating from the stadium. IBM says it leveraged its AI Highlights platform to digest video from last year’s U.S. Open and rank the ‘excitement level’ of various clips, which it compiled into a reel and classified to give each a crowd reaction score. IBM used hundreds of hours of footage to extract crowd sounds, which it plans to make available to ESPN production teams that will serve it dynamically based on play. How natural these AI-generated sounds will be remains a question. Some fans have taken issue with the artificiality of noises produced by platforms like Electronic Arts’ Sounds of the Stands, which simulates crowd sounds using technology borrowed from the publishers’ FIFA game series. The NBA has reportedly considered mixing in audio from NBA 2K during its broadcasts, and the NFL is expected to use artificial fan noise for its live games this year if they’re played in empty stadiums.”
Whether fake crowd noise sounds authentic, do viewers really want to pretend there is a live crowd when there is not? Perhaps; the pandemic is affecting people in strange ways. There has even been a call to bring back canned laughter while it is too risky to gather live studio audiences for sit coms.
The other technology IBM hopes will garner attention at the Open is Watson Discovery, which we’re told will facilitate tennis debates between online viewers by feeding them questions and researching the validity of resulting arguments. The same platform will supply factoids about upcoming matches through the smartphone app. It seems Watson is auditioning for the job of sport commentator.
Ouch! Was that Watson or the line judge? Watson? Watson?
Cynthia Murrell, September 10, 2020
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