Intel: Outputting Horse Hooey (Translation for Thumbtypers: Nonsense)
February 16, 2021
I read “Intel Mocks Apple’s M1 MacBooks in Grudge-Bearing Ad Campaign.” Let’s assume that the information in the Tech Radar article is spot on. I learned:
Intel is back to mocking Apple, having posted a series of tweets highlighting the shortcomings of Apple’s M1 processors.
Yep, Intel and the tweeter thing.
The article points out that Apple divorced Intel from its M1 computers. But there are visitation writes for some Apple computers I think.
The write up points out:
Intel’s tweets link to a video from YouTuber Jon Rettinger, that compare laptops equipped with Intel chips to Apple’s ?M1? Macs. “If you’re looking for a good laptop in 2021, there are many things to consider, but processor choice might be more important than you think,” a description on Rettinger’s video reads. “You might be considering Apple’s new M1-based laptops, but before you hit the buy button, let me show you what Intel’s new Evo laptops can offer you!” Intel’s aggressive tweets come just days after the company posted a series of cherry-picked benchmarks designed to provide that its 11th-generation processors are better than Apple’s ARM-based M1 chips.
I have pointed out that Intel’s Horse Ridge announcement struck me as horse feathers. If Intel is using the tweeter to output negative vibes and fiddling benchmarks, is it possible that Intel has moved from horse ridge to horse feathers?
I prefer innovation, demonstrations of technical competence
Stephen E Arnold, February 16, 2021
Elastic and Its Approach to Its Search Business
February 16, 2021
This blog post is about Elastic, the Shay Banon information retrieval company, not Amazon AWS Elastic services. Confused yet? The confusion will only increase over time because the “name” Elastic is going to be difficult to keep intact due to Amazon’s ability to erode brand names.
But that’s just one challenge the Elastic search company founded by the magic behind Compass Search. An excellent analysis of Elastic search’s challenges appears in “Elastic Has Stretched the Patience of Many in Open Source. But Is There Room for a Third Way?”
The write up quotes an open source expert as saying:
Let’s be really clear – it’s a move from open to proprietary as a consequence of a failed business model decision…. Elastic should have though their revenue model through up front. By the time the team made the decision to open source their code, the platform economy existed and their decisions to open source ought to
have been aligned to an appropriate business model.
I circled this statement in the article:
Sympathy for Elastic’s position comes from a perhaps unexpected source. Matt Assay, principal at Elastic’s bête noire AWS, believes it’s time to revisit the idea of “shared source”, a licensing scheme originally dreamed up by Microsoft two decades ago as an answer to the then-novel open source concept. In shared source, code is open – as in visible – but its uses are restricted… The heart of the problem is about who gets to profit from open source software. To help resolve that problem, we just might need new licensing.
Information retrieval is not about precision and recall, providing answers to users, or removing confusion about terms and product names — search is about money. Making big bucks from a utility service continues to lure some and smack down others. Now it is time to be squishy and bouncy I suppose.
Stephen E Arnold, February 16, 2021
Google: An Homage to Donald Rumsfeld
February 16, 2021
I read “Uncovering Unknown Unknowns in Machine Learning.” The title reminded me of Donald Rumsfeld who served as US Secretary of Defense fro9m 1975 to 1977. He is the author of Known and Unknown: A Memoir. He allegedly coined the quip:
There are known knowns, things we know that we…” “There are known knowns, things we know that we know; and there are known unknowns, things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns, things we do not know we don’t know.”
The Google blog post states:
The goal of the challenge is to raise the bar in ML evaluation sets and to find as many examples as possible that are confusing or otherwise problematic for algorithms to process.
Yep, Google wants others to help it deal with unknown unknowns. I won’t chop the logic of Mr. Rumsfeld’s alleged quip. I absolutely won’t compare knowing unknown unknowns to Google’s attempt to “solve death.”
I will make three observations:
- I think that the Google wants to use this type of Fancy Dan initiative to get in front of the tempest swirling around Timnit Gebru incendiary devices
- The desire to associate Google with something inherent in trying to make smart software do more than sell ads threads through the CATS4ML announcement. I think of the announcement as a variant of “stuff happens” and not even the Google can figure it out
- The initiative may be a building block in Google’s Spring 2021 game plan which will allow more ad revenue to flow whilst neutralizing difficult decisions about staff who raise uncomfortable research topics.
My three points are known unknowns. These are less troublesome than Google’s bold efforts to solve death and identify unknown unknowns. Nope, I don’t want to do the phenomenological existentialism of smart software. Not for me. Too old.
Stephen E Arnold, February 16, 2021
Data Security: Clubhouse Security and Data Integrity Excitement?
February 15, 2021
Here in rural Kentucky “clubhouse” means a lower cost shack where some interesting characters gather. There are many “clubs” in rural Kentucky, and not many of them are into the digital flow of Silicon Valley. Some of those “members” do love the tweeter and similar real time, real “news” systems.
Imagine my surprise when I read Stanford Internet Observatory’s report from its Cyber Policy Center “Clubhouse in China: Is the Data Safe?” I thought that the estimable Stanford hired experts who knew that “data” is plural. Thus the headline from the highly intellectual SIPCPC would have written the headline “Clubhouse in China: Are the Data Safe?” (Even some of the members of the Harrod’s Creek moonshine club know that subject-verb agreement is preferred even for graduates of the local skill high school.
Let’s overlook the grammar and consider the “real” information in the write up. The write up has six authors. That’s quite a team.
The SIPCPC determined that Clubhouse uses software and services from a company based in Shanghai. The question is, “Does the Chinese government have access to the data flowing in the Clubhouse super select and awfully elite “conversations”?
The answer it turns out is, “Huh. What?”
Clubhouse was banned by the Chinese government. SIPCPC (I almost typed CCP but caught myself) and the response from the Clubhouse dances around the issue. There are assurances that Clubhouse is going to be more strong.
The only problem is that the SIPCPC and the Clubhouse write up skirt such topics as:
- Implications of the SolarWinds’ misstep which operated for month prior to detection and there are zero indicators reporting that the breach and its malware have been put in the barn.
- Intercept technology within data centers in many countries make it possible to capture information (bulk and targeted)
- The decision to rely on Agora raises interesting implications about the judgment of the Clubhouse management team.
Net net: Interesting write up which casts an interesting light on the SIPCPC findings and the super zippy Clubhouse. If one cannot get subject verb agreement correct, what other issues have been ignored?
Stephen E Arnold, February 15, 2021
A Gap in Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence: Do Not Tell the Writers of Marketing Collateral, Please
February 15, 2021
Another study and minimal information about methodology. Accurate or not? Meh. Interesting? Yes.
“Study Uncovers Widespread Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Knowledge Gap” presents information that seems like something Captain Obvious, a well know expert on what’s in plain sight may know. Some examples from the write up may be illustrative:
Finding the right data is a problem for participants in Asia
More than one-third (32%) of respondents report artificial intelligence R&D initiatives that have been tested and abandoned or failed.
Outfits that have successfully implemented AI and machine learning programs report increased productivity (47%) and increased understanding of your business and customers (42%) as the top benefits. Question: What’s productivity? How is it measured? What’s understanding?
The majority of those in the sample (66%) are, to some degree, working with an experienced provider to navigate the complexities of AI and machine learning development. Question: What’s an “experienced provider”?
What did the survey reveal? Not much except that marketing collateral is a less difficult task than delivering demonstrably high value smart software and systems.
Stephen E Arnold, February 15, 2021
Is Business Intelligence the New Silver Bullet for Managers Who Want to Be Even More Intelligent?
February 15, 2021
Survey results from an outfit called Reveal contains some interesting market data. “Demand for Business Intelligence Solutions Increases by 41 Percent” provides some data about the sample size (120 developers and information technology Napoleons) but zero information about how these individuals were selected, the confidence level Reveal considers just peachy for the analysis, and other now old fashioned facets of a “survey” once taught in Statistics 101. Those YouTube videos about survey methods are good enough, thank you.
Here is one of the findings from the study:
A 41 percent increase in demand for business intelligence solutions in 2020.
Okay, financial, social, and political excitement, the Covid Rona thing, and the implosion of once boring business sectors like airlines, real estate, and local small businesses.
Business intelligence to the rescue with real time analyses of data, predictive analytics, and nifty charts and graphs.
Were there other findings from this remarkably amusing sample? Absolutely. To wit:
- 50 percent had budgets chopped
- 23 percent had projects killed
- 14 percent lost staff and funding.
Popular buzzwords include the aforementioned predictive analytics, edge analytics which I assume means cloud based services like Amazon AWS, and “natural learning” which I possibly machine learning, AI, et al.
Net net: Let’s bet on business intelligence. Better, faster, and cheaper. Plus, managers will be able to make better decisions based on actionable intelligence. Sounds good, right?
Stephen E Arnold, February 15, 2021
The Unthinkable: Will Google News and Facebook Pay Publishers for Content?
February 15, 2021
Regulators are beginning to agree with publishers that platforms like Google News should pay for the content they post. News Showcase is Google’s answer to this trend, and The Verge reveals it is operating in two new countries in, “Google Now Pays 450 Sites to Bring You Free News, Including Some Paywalled Stories.” In the UK, 120 publishers have enlisted in alongside 40 in Argentina. Those nations join Germany and Brazil, where News Showcase launched last year, and Australia, which joined in just last week. The last example is in interesting study in regulatory pressure and corporate acquiescence. Writer Jon Porter explains:
“Last week, Google News Showcase launched in Australia, a country where the company is currently locking horns with lawmakers over new rules that could force it to pay news publishers for their content. Google recently threatened to pull its search engine from the country if the News Media Bargaining Code goes into effect. Last week, Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he’d held ‘constructive’ talks with Google CEO Sundar Pichai over the new rules. The situation means that although seven Australian publishers have joined the program, covering over 25 publications, The Guardian reports that one outlet, Nine, chose not to negotiate with Google until the new code is brought in. In an FAQ, Google says it believes News Showcase should be compatible with the new rules, since publishers are free to enter into arbitration if they don’t like Google’s News Showcase deal.”
Google plans to soon add France, Canada, and Japan to its News Showcase roster. Meanwhile, Facebook has a similar plan. It is phasing content for which it is actually paying publishers into its News tab, which serves up both curated and personalized content. The initiative started in the US and recently began operation in the UK. Now we know the big tech companies are not completely impervious to regulatory pressure. What is next?
Cynthia Murrell, February 15, 2021
Why Use an Open Source Database? Brilliant Inadvertent Explanation
February 15, 2021
I thought, “Why bother to read ‘Everything You Should Know about the Oracle Database.’” I am delighted that I did. I read the article in The Tech Block twice! The information attempts to explain some of Oracle’s licensing guidelines. The author does a workmanlike job of explaining number of users; for example:
If you create an account for five hundred individuals, and only fifty individuals use it, you still need about five hundred licenses. This means that you’ve got to pay utmost attention to who is accessing the software. In addition, you may require a separate license not only for people but also for devices that directly or indirectly access the database. It’s also essential that you constantly check who needs access and who doesn’t. This will help you not only reduce your risk of exposure but also save you money. Being found contravening Oracle licensing agreements can be very costly. In some extreme cases, organizations have been fined millions of dollars.
The point is Oracle charges for people who don’t use the database. On one hand, this makes sense. Oracle has to do “work” to configure a database to handle users. (Remember the good old days of having to allocate more memory to a table. Ho ho ho. Wait. The good old days are today’s days.)
The write up contains eight more missteps an Oracle customer can trip and break the bean counter’s financial ankles.
Net net: The explanation makes it quite clear why some organizations use open source databases. Perhaps the author did not intend to anti-market Oracle’s database? From my point of view, that is exactly what the information in “Everything You Should Know…” delivers.
Stephen E Arnold, February 16, 2021
Who Knew That Journalism Could Channel the Worldwide Wrestling Federation?
February 12, 2021
In this corner, the newspaper founded by Alexander Hamilton and now owned by the News Corporation. In case you did not know, News Corporation is the nurturer of “real” news outfits like Dow Jones (Wall Street Journal), some outfits in England, and Harper Collins. Like Crocodile Dundee, News Corporation is a tough bit of kangaroo jerky. You may recall that some Murdochers were involved in what Wikipedia describes in an amusing way as the “news international phone hacking scandal.” I can see the laser lights and hear the death metal soundtrack now.
In the other corner is the Gray Lady, clutching its digital subscription financial reports, like a mace. The Gray Lady is a deceptive entity. Due to age or a careless record retention policy, the New York Times’ power house does not recall that Wikipedia summarizes this way:
Controversies include allegations of biased and inaccurate reporting of the Russian Revolution, reporting on Wen Ho Lee’s alleged theft of government documents, the Jayson Blair plagiarism scandal, articles by Judith Miller, the MoveOn.org ad controversy, the 2006 Duke lacrosse team scandal, the John McCain lobbyist controversy in 2008, and various accusations of: plagiarism, a leftist bias, Anti-Indian sentiment, Anti-British sentiment, and Antisemitism.
Does the Gray Lady remember muffing the online ball almost 50 years ago when Jeff Pemberton deployed the newspaper’s first digital service? I would be a WWF ticket stub that she nor her minions do. Cue the lasers. Crank up the rap music.
What are these two estimable outfits squabbling about?
The New York Post’s “real” news article “Read the Column the New York Times Didn’t Want You to Read” reports:
Last weekend, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens wrote a piece criticizing the rationale behind the forced ouster of Times reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr., but it was never published. Stephens told colleagues the column was killed by publisher A.G. Sulzberger. Since then, the piece has circulated among Times staffers and others — and it was from one of them, not Stephens himself, that The Post obtained it. We publish his spiked column here in full.
Is this the end of the story?
Nope. Two sweaty and quite capable contestants have now stepped into the ring. I await the bell and an opportunity to purchase a pay per view ticket so that I can enjoy the tussle.
Who knew that “real” news could be so exciting? I assume that the streaming video game version of this event will be available. Will there be an Amazon or Netflix content object available? The NFL has a good business model to emulate.
I must go. The referee is explaining the rules: No low blows, no eye gouging, etc. Would these contestants violate the ref’s instructions? Not with intent I assume.
Stephen E Arnold, February 12, 2021
Does Nevada Want to Channel the Google Toronto Set Up?
February 12, 2021
I read a surprising write up called “Bill Would Allow Tech Companies to Create Local Governments.” The article asserts:
According to a draft of the proposed legislation, obtained by the Review-Journal but not yet introduced in the Legislature, Innovation Zones would allow tech companies like Blockchains, LLC to effectively form separate local governments in Nevada, governments that would carry the same authority as a county, including the ability to impose taxes, form school districts and justice courts and provide government services, to name a few duties.
Interesting. Visualize a Googlopolis. What about Facebookity? I like Appleorchards. These could be in the great state of Nevada. I am not sure that Toronto, Ontario, Canada, will be embracing corporation cities. One of my friends pointed out that Google wanted to drive the bus, collect the fares in the form of a tax kickback, and implement helpful surveillance systems. Maybe this person was off base, but Nevada perceives an opportunity to allow a good corporate citizen to create its own city.
What if a Tesla in Facebookity drives over a citizen? No problem. The corporate entity will point out that the citizen’s estate would be held responsible for damage to the vehicle. (I am assuming that the Tesla terminated the human behaving outside the envelope of the smart software.) Corporations are people too, and when a company is a city, many opportunities exist to innovate.
Yes, Nevada, a great state. I think it has given up trying to convince people in Harrod’s Creek that it not just a gambling hub. It is much, much more. (Bring your own water if you visit.)
Stephen E Arnold, January 12, 2021
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