Vimeo: A Case Study in Management Desperation?
March 19, 2022
Video is expensive. Bandwidth is a killer. Even storage is a problem at scale. Then there is marketing, customer acquisition, customer retention, and paying those who deserve the big bucks. Vimeo wants to generate revenue, and it has been struggling to be upfront about its predicament: Money.
A couple of years ago, I put my DarkCyber videos on Vimeo. I was curious about the platform. I think I had a dozen or so 12 minute programs on the service. I received an email explaining that because I was a commercial customer, I had to pay a lot of money. I liked that angle crafted by 20 somethings sitting in a cramped, uncomfortable conference room figuring out who was commercial and who was not.
My criteria were:
- I was retired
- My videos contained zero advertising
- I made the programs available to those attending my lectures at FLETC, the ISS Telestrategies’ conferences, and the National Cyber Crime Conferences, among others
- I don’t sell anything any more.
The Vimeo automated system informed me that I had to pay up or have my videos deleted. I cancelled my account and deleted the videos. I mentally noted that Vimeo was floundering. Where is that life preserver? Ooops. Not near me.
I read “Vimeo Is Sorry, and Here’s How It’s Changing.” The write up dances around the central problem of Vimeo: Making money. There’s hand waving from Vimeo management. There’s information about Vimeo’s contradictory statements about “policies.” There’s information about exceptions for special people.
Enough. Vimeo is stuck. Vimeo’s management is apparently rudderless. And most important, I find the firm’s splashing around in the pool mildly amusing. Will it gulp water and drown? Will it become the new Rumble or BitChute? Will the firm’s decisive management team knock YouTube for a loop.
Splish. Splash. Vimeo is taking a bath and there is no party going on.
Stephen E Arnold, March 25, 2022
Zuck Pestered by Legal Flies in Canberra
March 18, 2022
My most interesting experience in Canberra was the flies. These knew I was giving a lecture at the International Chiefs of Police Conference. I met a number of dedicated and effective law enforcement professionals. But I remember the flies. These critters besieged me when I walked from the conference hotel to a small market. I know I bought a hat with a mesh curtain, but the flies were persistent.
Meta Facebook whatever is learning that there are dedicated and effective public servants in Australia. The Zuck is discovering what I conceptualize as lawyers with the stick-to-ativity of those Canberra flies.
“Australian Watchdog Sues Facebook-Owner Meta over Scam Advertisements” — from a trusted source no less — explains that the Australian competition watchdog is taking action for Zuck’s alleged advertising methods. What are these? Nothing new: Allegations of questionable conduct and in appropriate use of images. (Note: You may have to cough up personal data or pay to view the source article from those trust worthy folks.)
I am not sure how Meta’s leadership team is leaning in to this most recent challenge. One downstream consequence is that countries allied with Australia are likely to monitor the legal action. If it prevails, other countries may pursue similar actions.
Flies. Annoying.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2022
Online Advertising: A Trigger Warning May Be Needed
March 18, 2022
I read “How Can We Know If Paid Search Advertising Works?” The write up is about Google but it is not about Google in my opinion. A number of outfits selling messages may be following a well worn path: Statistical mumbo jumbo and fear of missing out on a big sale.
Advertising executives once relied on the mostly entertaining methods captured in “Mad Men.” In the digital era, the suits have been exchanged for khakis, shorts, and hoodies. But the objective is the same: Find an advertiser, invoke fear of missing out on a sale, and hauling off the cash. Will a sale happen? Yeah, but one never really knows if it was advertising, marketing, or the wife’s brother in law helping out an very odd younger brother who played video games during the Thanksgiving dinner.
The approach in the article is a mix of common sense and selective statistical analysis. The selective part is okay because the online advertisers engage in selective statistical behavior 24×7.
Here’s a statement from the article I found interesting:
It was almost like people were using the paid links, not to learn about products, but to navigate to the site. In other words, it appeared like selection bias with respect to paid click advertising and arrival at the site was probably baked into their data.
The observation that search sucks or that people use ads because they are lazy are equally valid. The point is that online advertisers a fearful of missing a sale. These lucky professionals will, therefore, buy online ads and believe that sales are a direct result. But there may be some doubt enhanced by the incantations of the Web marketing faction of the organization who say, “Ads are great, but we have to do more search engine optimization.”
A two-fer. The Web site and our products/services are advertised and people buy or “know” about our brand or us. By promoting the Web site we get the bonus sales from the regular, non paid search findability. This argument makes many people happy, particularly the online ad sales team and probably the SEO consulting experts. The real payoff is that the top dog’s anxiety level decreases. He/she/them is/are happier campers.
Identifying causal effects does not happen with wishes.
I am no expert in online advertising. I think the write up suggests that the data used to prove the value of online advertising is shaped. Wow, what a surprise? Why would the leaders in selling online advertising craft a message which may not be anchored in much more than “wishes”.
Money? Yep, money.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2022
Artificial Intelligence Generates Interesting Clowns Perfect for Kiddies
March 18, 2022
Like the Boston Dynamics’ robot reindeer, these constructs delight the eye. I wondered how many pre school and kindergarten classes would use the robot reindeer how technology improves a holiday experience.
“See the Terrifying Video of Artificial Intelligence Generating Infinite Killer Clowns” sparked a new idea in my 77 year old mine. Why not use these videos at children’s parties. My hunch is that some would find these clowns a hoot.
The write up states:
… it probably never would have occurred to the futurists of the 20th century, not even in their wildest dream, that once artificial intelligence was developed, it would almost immediately be put to use to create nightmare landscapes of killer clowns.
I would love to illustrate this blog post with an image from the YouTube video cited in the write up. There are, however, the ever present defender of truth, justice, and revenue generation watching to make sure that no image is used without paying. Hats off to Getty, YouTube, Steve Pigeon, and others for making writing fun again.
Navigate to the article. Click the link. View the child centric clowns. Do some of these constructs resemble those who work tirelessly to enforce their view of rules and make money? Sure.
I watched the video and noted a possible resemblance between the terror inducing images and some interesting people I have encountered.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2022
Twitch to Ban Agents of False Information
March 18, 2022
Amazon, proud owner of streaming platform Twitch, wades into a swamp in which there are snakes and other dangerous creatures. IGN reports, “Twitch Introducing New Rules to Stop Misinformation Spreaders.” The brief write-up describes the new policy:
“The policy update will target streamers who consistently make false claims, on or off Twitch, regarding protected groups, health issues including COVID-19, public emergencies, and misinformation that promotes violence or diminishes civic systems such as election results. Angela Hession, Twitch’s vice president of trust and safety, said the website is ‘taking this precautionary step and updating our policies to ensure that these misinformation superspreaders won’t find a home on our service,’ per the New York Times. … all misinformation spreaders will be targeted by the new policy even if they don’t make false claims while streaming. Sharing the misinformation on other platforms such as Twitter is enough to warrant action against their Twitch account.”
We are guessing many users will object to this cross-platform policing. Vigorously. The company, however, must believe the threat of misinformation warrants the crackdown. The audience for streaming gamers has grown rapidly over the last several years, and the invasion in Ukraine has magnified the problem. Video games can look so real that some in-game footage has been presented as actual footage of the conflict. One developer is pleading with people not to use their software in this way. We are glad to see Amazon taking a stand even as it faces other Twitch-related problems.
Cynthia Murrell, March 18, 2022
Microsoft: Fun Search
March 17, 2022
We have censorship. We have discriminatory spidering. We have sites which are no longer indexed. And now if ZDNet’s “real” news team is on the money, we have search fun or fun search. You pick.
“Microsoft Is About to Add More Fun to Your Windows Search” reports:
… the Windows 10’s taskbar search box and search home pane will now feature content “including fun illustrations, which help you discover more, be connected, and stay productive. Search highlights will present notable and interesting moments of what’s special about each day – like holidays, anniversaries, and other educational moments in time both globally and in your region.
Great. How about that Windows search. Do you have a Drobo or similar storage device. I bet that Windows search will make that “fun.” What about a desire to locate an actual file on the C: or boot drive? I bet Microsoft will make that fun too. And I could go on? For example, don’t you love Microsoft search syntax? And let’s not forget “unfindable” files. Yeah, that’s a winner too!
How about search that just works, includes Boolean, and provides one click access to sample syntax? That would be fun too.
Stephen E Arnold, March 17, 2022
The Promise of Curated Apps
March 17, 2022
It is much easier to describe something than it is to produce a thing that matches the slide deck. I am not sure if the information in “Vicious SharkBot Banking Trojan Discovered in Play Store Antivirus App” is spot on. The tip off for me is the description of malware as “vicious.” The metaphors of sharks, apps, and vicious don’t work, but I get the idea.
The main point of the write up strikes me as:
British IT security researchers discovered, an updated SharkBot is hiding inside an innocent-looking antivirus app which is still available on the Google Play Store as of Saturday.
The interesting function is that the malware includes a function which performs automatic transfers. The money is in an account until it is not.
How does one obtain the app? The write up alleges that one might visit the Google Play Store and download something called Antivirus Super Cleaner.”
If the story is accurate, one has to consider this question, “Who is the minder of the Google Play Store?” An intern, a snorkeling bit of smart software, a contractor obtained via Upwork, a full time employee looking for a lateral arabesque to a hot new project, no one, or some other mechanism?
Imagine. No one minding the store. A new approach to curation perhaps?
Stephen E Arnold, March 17, 2022
The Cloud Horse Race: Rounding Turn One Is the Azure Softie with an Advantage
March 17, 2022
Listen to the cheers of the crowd. “Azure Pulls in Front of AWS in Public Cloud Adoption” says about a really probably objective study:
The key takeaway on the Azure front is its leadership with enterprise users, with 80 percent of respondents adopting Microsoft’s public cloud, up from 76 percent the previous year. This was just ahead of AWS, which claimed a 77 percent adoption rate, down from 79 percent a year earlier. Some way behind was Google, with 48 percent, followed by Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, which tumbled to 27 percent from 32 percent a year ago.
And what outfit generated this straight-from-the-race-track report? Flexera, that’s who. And who or what is Flexera? It is an outfit which has joined the Microsoft Azure Marketplace and “offers game changing solutions to help application producers monetize their solutions in Azure.” Got that. You can read more at this link.
Is this information about the outstanding speed of adoption and uptake of the well bred stallion accurate?
Like Jack Benny’s race track tout says,
“Pssst. Hey, bud, watch that Bezos nag.”
To sum up, marketing PR is not a guarantee of a race winner.
Stephen E Arnold, March 17, 2022
AI—Past, Present, and Future
March 17, 2022
We are surrounded by neural-network AIs. As MIT Technology Review’s Clive Thompson puts it:
“They help Gmail autocomplete your sentences, help banks detect fraud, let photo apps automatically recognize faces, and—in the case of OpenAI’s GPT-3 and DeepMind’s Gopher—write long, human-sounding essays and summarize texts. They’re even changing how science is done; in 2020, DeepMind debuted AlphaFold2, an AI that can predict how proteins will fold—a superhuman skill that can help guide researchers to develop new drugs and treatments.”
How did we get here, and where is this technology going? Thompson’s article, “What the History of AI Tells Us About its Future,” explores that question. The piece would make a good introduction to the subject or a helpful refresher for those wishing to jog their memory. The piece also makes reasonable predictions about the road ahead. Because, ready or not, society is firmly on that path.
The write-up begins by recounting the tale of chess king Deep Blue from IBM (Watson’s precursor). Deep Blue evolved from Deep Thought, a project out of Carnegie Mellon that became the first chess AI to beat a grand master in 1988. Deep Blue’s 1997 victory over world champion Garry Kasparov was huge news. But despite the investment of a dozen years and an estimated $100 million, the software failed to pan out for IBM in the long run. The article quotes Deep Thought’s co-developer Murray Campbell:
“‘It didn’t lead to the breakthroughs that allowed the [Deep Blue] AI to have a huge impact on the world,’ Campbell says. They didn’t really discover any principles of intelligence, because the real world doesn’t resemble chess. ‘There are very few problems out there where, as with chess, you have all the information you could possibly need to make the right decision,’ Campbell adds. ‘Most of the time there are unknowns. There’s randomness.’”
That is where neural networks come in. Designed to mimic the complexities of human reasoning, this technology was still widely dismissed until a decade or so ago. Now its algorithms are everywhere—and slamming into limitations of their own. Sometimes literally, as with self-driving cars that encounter a situation their trainers failed to anticipate. And don’t even get us started on machine learning bias. Thompson writes:
“The problem is, no one knows quite how to build neural nets that can reason or use common sense. Gary Marcus, a cognitive scientist and coauthor of Rebooting AI, suspects that the future of AI will require a ‘hybrid’ approach—neural nets to learn patterns, but guided by some old-fashioned, hand-coded logic. This would, in a sense, merge the benefits of Deep Blue with the benefits of deep learning. … The future may look less like an absolute victory for either Deep Blue or neural nets, and more like a Frankensteinian approach—the two stitched together.”
Perhaps. Or maybe someone will come up with something new altogether—it could happen. To learn more about AI’s past, present, and future, curious readers should check out the article for themselves.
Cynthia Murrell, March 17, 2022
TikTok and Facebook: Which is Othello? Which Is Iago?
March 16, 2022
I spotted a short item in Mashable, a very “real news” online service. The story is “Facebook Joins TikTok. Keep Your Enemies Close, We Guess.” The earth shaking news is that a me too outfit has obtained an account on another me too service. The write up states:
Facebook has just launched on TikTok, following in the footsteps of Instagram. In other words, Meta’s companies are really making a home for themselves on a competitor platform.
Okay. There is one quite important observation in the article. Here is my “quote” of the day:
Once again, the vortex of apps on apps is expanding.
The idea is that a service like TikTok is spawning applications which use TikTok as a platform. I think the idea is “meta”, no pun intended.
If one wants eyeballs, why not go where the eyeballs are?
Will there be a software app to allow a user to publish Facebook and Instagram content simultaneously to TikTok?
I can hardly wait. As that social media expert Willie of Stratford wrote:
Trifles light as air are to the jealous confirmations strong as proofs of holy writ.
Yep, jealousy and me-too’ism — a potent mixture.
Stephen E Arnold, March 16, 2022
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