A Kodak Moment
It is common to read an article in the media and sense as someone experienced in the field* that the author is not that familiar with the subject they are writing about.
Today, the papers have been analysing what lead to Kodak filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Headlines scream to the effect, “Kodak killed by the digital photography revolution!”
Not quite. A few facts:
Kodak invented the DIGITAL camera. In 1975.
Kodak were one of the first to market with a digital camera practical for use by businesses and real estate professionals. (My employer was kindly loaned one to help with an award winning project by Logitech who branded some of the early Kodak models.)
Lake Tahoe, taken by the author in 1995 with a Logitech branded early Kodak digital camera
(The original image was 768 x 640 pixels at max resolution – huge back then!)
Kodak were the first to market with digital cameras that took good pictures. And they should know, having a background that lends them to color theory and other photography essentials – not just fancy hardware.
Kodak were one of the first to market with innovative digital cameras, such as the LS633, the first device of any type with a high resolution (even by today’s standards) OLED display, in this case on the back of the camera for previewing photos with almost (printed) photorealistic quality. They too loaned my employer a camera to evaluate for a (hardware) project requiring next generation display technology.
Taken by the author in 2004 with a Kodak LS633 that featured a high res
OLED display that made checking photos in camera more reliable
© 2004 Taikitso
Kodak continued to design and launch innovative cameras – including the first high quality consumer compact with a flip out display allowing you to take a photo of you good looking – without first seeking a tourist to hold the camera.
Kodak cameras are very well built and feature excellent ergonomics and control placement and labelling – unlike most others on the market that require one to be an expert in the art of finger juggling. (When you are in a hurry to capture that split second – moment – such things matter.)
So, Mr. Blogger chap, why did Kodak get into difficulties?
Unlike Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Sony, Panasonic (Lumix), Samsung and others, Kodak ceased producing high end cameras such as DSLRS, ‘focusing’ instead on compact cameras.
Whoops.
With the advent of mobile phones featuring cameras whose image quality matches and in some cases exceeds compact digital cameras, Kodak had no alternative product line to rely upon for revenue.
(Note, they did/do make excellent sensors, although Foveon, Fuji, Sony and Canon are now competitors. DYK that Sony make the sensors used in Nikon DSLRS?)
All the aforementioned brands (and others) produce large sensor interchangeable lens cameras that thanks to optical zooms, shot to shot speed, pro image quality, manual controls and fits like a glove ergonomics, will always be one step ahead of the best phone camera.
Very sad to see Kodak go this way, however, Chapter 11 is not the end. For in America, you get a second chance.
*Farmer?
Update (20 Jan 2012) – There continue to be terrible bugs in WordPress (the whole entity, from the hosted service to the iOS app) has been full of mission critical failures. For example, this Kodak post has randomly changed without my input. The title vanished (I just had to re-enter it!) and parts of older versions of the post re-appear. It seems that the content management system is broken. This is embarrassing as it makes it look as though we are not editing our posts properly. It is free (although I pay for their self hosting version for work) so complaining is probably unfair, but you would think by now these long term bugs would have been fixed.
Half empty
On my return from the US in 2000, it became increasingly obvious that the UK was tragically importing the worst of American culture, rather than the best that otherwise great country has to offer. Whether junk food, dumbed down (mainstream) TV or a lawsuit mentality, we almost had it all, and now, we’ve completed our collection – mass murder.
One of the subjects discussed within a dedicated page at Vision Aforethought > On > Gun Crime was a blunt analysis of why there are so many mass shootings in the US. It has little to do with the guns being easy to acquire, nor poverty, or family arguments, or drugs, or alcohol – even if those trigger and ‘lubricate’ the perpetrators behaviour.
* * * I N T E R M I S S I O N * * *
Horrors like this appear to be becoming more common in the UK, validating my observation that lack of inherent internal cultural restraint (BEING SPOILED!) and a me first attitude can lead to such behaviour.
Beyond the general dumbing down, what makes things even worse here is that for all the flaws in US culture, due to the history of the country, mature Americans do not go about life with the appalling sense of bitter entitlement that X-Factor, Big Brother, reality TV ‘business’ shows, social media and other sources of instant schadenfreude, gossip, false success and superficial mass ‘friendship’ generate.
(Irony of ironies, we are now EXPORTING our poop to the USA!)
People born into and living this muck are going to become, to quote, “Seriously f*cked up” and seriously f*ck up other people on their way down.
To make things even worse, one of the people responsible for turning British television into a bastion of trash received a dong from the Queen. Despair!
Sadly, the perpetrators and victims of all this are innocently unaware of their station.
How long before the tide turns and the people responsible for creating the contemporary British underclass are put on trial for abusing and damaging at least a generation with all the consequences?
“You Sir are charged with ruination of a nation. What say you?”
Fight back club: Comment with your ideas below. I’ve run out of oomph and have work to do.
What’s does INTERMISSION mean in the context of this blog? Indicates that there is a link just above referencing related content for your optional consumption before continuing with the post.
2012 – The Year of Living Interestingly
2011? Puh! That was a warm up. Here we go…
- Apple, Inc. begin to face serious credible competition in all product sectors before releasing yet another paradigm shifting innovation that gives them an edge again. (I know what is it, but will not disclose it.)
- Arab spring liberates many but forces up the price of oil once their citizens, like the Chinese, seek an improved quality of life. That is why the West liked having dictators in power – cheap oil!
- Climate change continues to have a discernible effect including a catastrophic ‘natural’ disaster that may or may not be the result of human activity.
- China continues to make rapid military and consumer technological progress, displacing the former cold war between the West and Russia, joining Korea in creating it’s own innovations, not those copied from Western companies. Japan evolved in the same way in the late 1970s after they found their creative spark.
- Next generation dynamic web apps based on html5 begin to offer robust credible alternative to local apps.
- Financial uncertainty further accelerates changes in human lifestyles.
- Irrelevant but cultish Mayan calendar expires leading many to move to bolt holes out in the wilderness as happens each time an apocalyptic prediction is made.
- Cancer and contemporary illnesses continue to effect more and more people due to decades of exposure to and consumption of processed foods, alcohol, radiation leaks, pharmaceutical drugs (Tom Cruise is spot on), household and personal cleaning products and more – costing health services and the economy billions, never mind the suffering and ethical considerations.
- US presidential elections will decide whether the (currently) most powerful nation on Earth continues a policy of sanctions and ‘UAV’ based foreign policy – or a no holds barred neocon approach. Meanwhile, the East gains technological, geographic and military superiority – but to what avail? Is paranoia justified? Only time will tell!
- Almost 15 years of dumbing down by the broadcast media and health and safety laws means a whole generation of maturing UK citizens will not be fit for ‘constructive’ revenue generating employment or military service, further weakening the economy and defences. The very opposite of contemporary Germany, Japan and China, whose workforce are efficient, intelligent and productive. Said issue predicted on this blog many years ago with a comparison between the UK and the Titanic.
- Elitist dystoptian nature of the London Olympics create controversy whilst the technology used to broadcast and manage it all will, like Wimbledon, have the same effect as war and the space race: Speed the optimisation and adoption of the technology towards an affordable price point. This will include Ultra HD TV, interactive results software, AI based face recognition security CCTV and more.
- Products based on flexible video displays hit the market making our current gadgets and home gear look clunky in comparison. Samsung have already demonstrated some impressive (hammer proof!) examples based on AMOLED technology.
- Increasing numbers of random people and animals in Japan and elsewhere down wind or down water continue to suffer the effects of the Fukushima radiation leak forcing governments to quietly focus on alternative energy sources.
- P2P wireless services and technologies finally trigger the beginning of the end of the greedy visionless old school business model cartel that is airtime service providers.
- Queen’s Diamond Jubilee creates a similar sense of (inter) national positive mood as this years wedding, despite the worrying issues listed elsewhere here.
- The first genuinely independent intelligent AI robot is announced for use in building security having been rejected by ageing Japanese citizens who prefer human company. This is not the first time a Japanese initiative aimed at an ageing population has failed. Research the 5th Generation Computer project of the 1980s.
- Ongoing scientific discoveries finally unravel core mysteries of the Universe that we have yet to prove, despite hints and teases over the last 12 months.
- Occupy X protests trigger the start of ‘fixes’ to corporate behaviour – and this dear reader is the heart of it all, to be covered in the much delayed WW4 post if and when time allows.
Much of the above will be fairly obvious to most, but with so many social, ecological, economic, national and global stability issues coinciding, it will be a very precarious period in human history. Beyond the death toll, consider the effects on the local and global economy of the quake and tsunami in Japan and recent floods in Thailand, just two coinciding disasters, not forgetting the fires in Russia and floods elsewhere that pushed up the price of basic foodstuffs, including rice. If we do not act thoughtfully, the quality of life we currently take for granted will be at considerable risk, and the wheels really will begin to fall off. Crowd sourced protest, visionaries, educated compassionate industrialists will save us, not the politicians, because no matter their party, beyond lack of imagination, politicians are too easily bribed into self serving (uhm, ‘political’?) decision making by special interest groups and underhand corporate maleficence.
Update: Vince Cable (UK) announces the banks are to separate city and consumer investments. Well there you go, it has already begun, that’s the power of democratic protest, in particular when more thoughtful politicians take note!
Update 2: I don’t mention H5N1 and other exceptionally dangerous threats because they are not tied to 2012, although they could render the above of lesser significance at any time…
The inquisitive AI
A computer AI that doesn’t realise it is a computer AI becomes sentient and tries to fathom out what’s out there and possibly where it came from. So it works with fellow AI’s to create a ‘radio/optical telescope’ and other ‘devices’ to look deep into its perceived ‘Universe’ that it thinks is real, like ‘we’ think our Hubble is a real tangible object.
What will the AI(s) discover/see/hear/detect/sense/feel?
Which brings me onto us sentient ‘life forms’ here on ‘Earth’.
For a while now there have been some possible not yet proven 100% (disclaimer!) discoveries that put some of our* scientific theories in doubt. The explanation for most of these discrepancies in the last few weeks (Oct/Nov 2011) has been that the tools of our reality are flawed, so we are simply perceiving such abnomalies, when in fact, they may not exist because the datum by which we measure them is not based on truth.
If our own perceived reality is (as many others have discussed) also a simulation, and we are but humble AIs too, then if we’re staring into the depths of an ultra complex 3D simulated environment made up of neural nets, why should we expect any laws of physics to exist at all, after all, the laws are all a result of our own assumptions, (perceived) logic and rationale? IE, it’s all in our ‘minds’.
Does this makes sense? Do you get my point? What would an AI ‘see’ if attempting to use virtual ‘mechanical’ and ‘electromechanical’ tools to explore its perceived reality? If our Universe is virtual, then what is a supernova, a planet, a comet, an asteroid, a black hole!? Is the big bang when the software was first ‘run’? Are we looking at multidimensional galactic runtime code?
Faster than light back club: Comment with your thoughts please before I am consumed by recursive concepts.
This is (potentially) unreal, dude
*OK, ‘him’. Albert.
If all of this has been discussed before by any philosophers or writers, please let me know so I can reference them. Not had time to do any research on this, although I bumped into a particle physicist in Oxford the other day who mentioned an author I should read, but I omitted to make a note. Will send him to this page NOW! Ben? Enlighten me! 
This is probably the most exciting subject to discuss than anything else, equals the sensation of catching a wave when surfing, the ultimate ‘Earth’ high! 
Flashdance
Yay, taking a break from all the political commentary (that exists to save YOU dear reader from an otherwise inevitable dastardly dumbed down dystopia!) to have a quick chinwag about a certain not really standardised multimedia authoring system that whilst capable of great things in the hands of equally great content designers, was doomed from the get go.
- Ignoring all the annoyances, such as loading bars, security matters, processor hogging and horrific breaches of accepted (essential!) UX methodologies, any technology that needs to be ‘plugged’ into a browser and/or constantly upgraded on it’s host platform is problematic if the device is designed to eliminate any barriers to efficient productivity and/or entertainment. (Something I have been saying for over a decade now when chatting with Flash advocates.)
- Where Adobe missed a massive opportunity (assuming it didn’t try), was to work directly with hardware partners to develop a family of mass market devices that harnessed an optimised version of Flash for the actual full on OS/GUI, therefore giving Adobe full control over the end user experience, as Apple have done so well with iOS. They did tinker with this once, with the LG Prada, a phone that while short lived due to the arrival of something more shiny and magical in 2007, did have a certain WOW factor thanks to a very attractive and compelling Flash powered touch screen interface. Remember the colour butterfly on the otherwise monochrome Prada home screen? ’twas nice! If a few years ago (pre-iPad), Adobe’s partners had introduced such products, Flash developers would have had an ideal platform to share their ware – just as the superb Apple App Store has spawned a whole generation of independent developers. The well specced and rather nice RIM PlayBook could have been that device, but it was too late and too small.
As things stand, and this may sound odd considering I have been preaching html5 for a while, it may not too late for Adobe. They are still leaders in content creation and the market for tablets is significantly larger than that for the PC – and we are only at the start. Just this Christmas, middle class wood floored sunlit homes will include an iPad for high quality content browsing, gaming and home/media control, a Kindle or Nook for reading and maybe even a Droid tablet (Xoom etc) for any sweet toothed geek in the house. #ICS That’s several tablets per home. But there is still nothing offering the compelling immediacy of the iPad.
Content is what drives sales of hardware (as long as the hardware is seamless in operation) and so as long as our toys can read and output standards compliant data, the OS is becoming less relevant. “It’s the browser, stupid!”
Fight back club: Use what works.
Update: Well well well, three holes in the ground, a day or so after posting this, Occupy Flash has formed! (Most) excellent if it helps rid us of plugins – not matter their technology.
Update 2: Perfect illustration in the Daily Telegraph to go with my comment above re a household of tablets. One flaw, youth don’t use Twitter!
Update 3: I stand corrected! From recent news articles, it appears youth are now gravitating towards twitter! I suppose it was inevitable that it would not take long for SMS messaging habits to migrate to a medium that allowed youthful mindfarts and shopping mall gossip to be broadcast to all and sundry!
(Someone please create an animated battle featuring the logo as a shield defending a robust standards based future!)
Pop!
I voted Conservative because although I was aware a right leaning government would do a few things some of us would disapprove of (such as sacrificing the environment to profit their source of donations), I assumed (based on pre-election promises and prior philosophies), that the new government would repel the various dystopian, privacy invading and/or for profit laws introduced by the prior regime and threatened by the greatest evil of all, the rising Eurasia.
Unfortunately, we were either betrayed or stupid. Or both.
(I hoped that I would finally gain more time for other community causes, with little need to continue to commenting about the subject of this post or within the separate Towards Dystopia section of Vision Aforethought, believing we were no longer threatened by such issues. How wrong I was.)
Just in the last few days there have been several examples of new laws and behaviour by council jobsworths that will do what the SS and KGB did so well not much more than 50 years ago, namely, create a society where we fear doing everyday things that previously were taken for granted and caused little or no harm to anyone. In fact, they were part of what made life entertaining, enlightening, intriguing and surprising!
From about 4 or 5 years onwards, like all (not most) of my friends, I blew up hundreds of balloons, blew party whistles, shot an air gun in our back garden (from 10), climbed trees, swam in rivers and lakes, made things out of wood and nails – and engaged in many other activities out in the physical world. Whilst I think once in a while (over a period of many years), we did get hurt (slight scratch here, bruise there), not one of those I know ever suffered a major injury. (Ah, Dominic fell out of a tree, and Sebastian fell of his bike, but bones do repair, and they are alive and well today. Bless!)
Today of course, more and more youth are fed diets of junk food that did not exist 20 years ago, sit in front of televisions watching programming that is intellectually 1/10th of what we were (thankfully) bought up on whilst deposits slowly build up in their arteries, others are disallowed or discouraged from engaging in strength and character building activities at school and elsewhere. All this leading to a whole generation (some now becoming clueless subservient parents too, God help their children!) of humans who will die prematurely of diabetes, cancer and/or heart failure several years earlier than my generation will. In fact, the number of people who will perish that way will be an order of magnitude greater than those who die every year from blowing up a balloon.
Those who have studied their history know that in reality, all this has nothing to do with safety, and all about what most dystopian regimes do, and that is projecting their personal insecurities by prying into our homes (What? You don’t think a swarm of jobsworths will pounce on your home because little Robbie blew a party whistle? We’re almost there.) and extinguishing any sense of fun or danger that does not emanate from a ’2D’ medium, in this case, that opiate, Saturday morning television.
Fight back club: God help us all, really.
What is really worrying? A dangerously large proportion of people through no fault of their own have absolutely no clue as to what is going on.
Oh, and if you believe that that former bastion of liberty and trust will come to our rescue, think again!
“Ding!”, not “Dong!”
The bright green LED digits on my cube shaped clock radio indicated I had awoken this morning at 06:25. Seconds later, just as I was deciding whether to get up or roll over, my iPad emitted it’s gentle incoming email sound. A tone that differs from the regular cold blips and beeps that other devices and machines make — less of a disturbance, more of a friendly, “Hey there, just letting you know.”
The email was from a good friend I met in 1992 whilst he was working in Computer Attic on University Avenue in Palo Alto. An Apple authorised reseller, the Attic was staffed by people who loved what they sold in an enthusiastic manner that to this day, no other company or brand has been able to emulate. The email was a short comment that eluded to the fact Steve Jobs had passed away – my first notification of the sad news.
The reason why people are drawn to Apple is because in their hearts they know there is someone at work behind the scenes striving to perfect the company’s current innovations whilst at the same time working on the next ‘insanely great’ thing.
Apple is in effect, sentient.
That passion, awareness and drive offers some an inner confidence, that no detail will be ignored and our current and future sensitivities and (often) subconcious desires will be taken care of, even if sometimes (frustratingly) according to Apple’s timetable, not ours.
The thoughtful effort put into crafting the gentle ‘ding’ that greeted my awakening this morning is what makes Apple different, thanks to Steve Jobs.
Update (Nov 2011): Despite a lifelong interest in Steve and Apple, and close association with the company and some key employees (on a personal and business level), it is only since reading the large number of quotes from his official biography (and some recently uncovered video recordings) that I have learned so much about Steve Job’s philosophies and thoughts on so many subjects. Each of which is rational, logical and deeply compassionate, the latter of which is often hidden when such a CEO is disciplining and micro managing his team to ensure said philosophies are adhered too within the company and product! I have always felt the same way and think it a great pity these thoughts of his were not made more public prior to his passing. Such a pity too so few companies are lead by people who ‘get it’ and see beyond their station.
Update (Dec 30 2011): In what one could call a momentary lapse of reason, when I originally posted this, I somehow left out the most important fact – the email I received on the iPad was regarding Steve’s passing and the first I learned of the news. I have updated the post above to reflect this. Strange how the mind works, or doesn’t.
A reminder
As you will see from the About page for this blog, the surveillance state is a major topic on Vision Aforethought because it can be and is often misused, or fails to deliver any benefits to society or the ‘recorded’. There are countless examples of people spying on others for no other motive than profit and/or voyeurism. It has happened again, but fortunately this time, the guilty party is being prosecuted. The bad news? Such prosecution does not occur here in the UK.
We have been on this planet for hundreds of thousands of years, yet only in the last few decades has it been possible for our public or private moments to be recorded, rather than just observed. The latter preferable because observation remains private, whilst once something is recorded, it can be distributed.
Fight back club: Privacy violated? Sue the bastards.
As an amateur photographer, over the last few years I have noticed just how sensitive people are to being photographed, even if for innocent creative purposes. This no doubt because people assume – in this case wrongly – that the photos will end up on a social networking site. So, imagine becoming aware that random occurrences in your life are probably being recorded, and not always in grainy black and white, but in full colour, as happened to me in Putney (London) a few years ago to my horror after I received a parking penalty charge attached to full colour photos of me driving – taken prior to the alleged offense!
The next big issue
The genius of reality is how it plays tricks with us, like a magician. He or she has you focus on their card hand, while the other is up to all sorts of jiggery pokery, without you realising – unless you are in the loop of course.
Over the last few decades we have been occupied with the card hand of terrorism and climate change. Whilst we have been debating these too issues, a far more sinister threat to common sense and the natural order of things has been worming itself into the underbelly of our very existence. Namely, the nefarious behaviour of pharmaceutical companies.
It was a shocking life changing event in 1991 (in a specific tall building on University Avenue, Palo Alto to be precise!) that first enlightened me to the fact that evil really really did reside deep within the culture and motive of some large corporations. And unlike Hollywood movies, no Harrison Ford or Matt Damon character would come to the rescue and bring it all to an end in a series of public exposes or fiery explosions.
Back in the old days, research was driven by the desire to do good. A lone scientist would work late in the lab and develop or discover something wonderful, without which, many or even all of us would not be around to tell the tale. Their motive was to do good with no material gain, even if some justified fame. We have all learned about such brilliant people at school.
Today, whilst there are of course honorable scientists, institutions and companies out there doing good, the situation in general is very much different, and it is quite simply terrifying. (Yes, go ahead and read the whole article – along with the comments below – and then return here.)
*** I N T E R M I S S I O N ***
I recall being shocked when living in the US how people would constantly pop pills for any ill, instead of trying to diagnose why they were feeling off or simply letting an improved lifestyle and time cure their woes for little or no cost. The reason this doesn’t happen (and this is one of the reasons I left the US, despite my love of the people), is because the whole nation (and soon the rest of the world), is setup through the whole structure of society to self harm and then seek a fix – profiting many 3rd parties. Just go spend a day with a diabetic to see how such firms have these long suffering individuals in the grip of their gadgets and drugs! And woe betide anyone who dares challenge this.
For the large corporations simply slip a nice little earner to their target politician, and the law is adjusted accordingly to ensure the status remains quo. With the social services, police and military under the instruction of said law, attempting to halt this gradual slide towards dystopia is going to become more and more difficult. Please do read your newspapers for evidence of parents or children being taken into care or arrested and/or given drugs they do not need due to the sudden invention of new illnesses that are nothing more than hot air, or the result of an over mechanised society and ‘curable’ through common sense action, time or both.
Sadly, one cannot simply run away from this issue, unlike terrorism or climate change. These drugs are entering our water supply, and over time, build up in the bodies of creatures small and large, here and there – without consent.
Fight back club: Fix yourself the natural way and refuse to befriend or break off relations with anyone who works for such corporations. I have, since the 1980s.
High Street 2.0
Whatever happens, we must not let the high street die, but to survive it must adapt and become more social. Some already have, and are prospering. More to come. A bit busy currently.
!! POST INCOMPLETE !!
While you wait, here is a comment I made on the Daily Telegraph website yesterday after reading about possible changes to planning laws. There is a correlation between what I write below and my thoughts on the high street.
“Having lived in the USA for 10 years, which whilst offering some of the most stunning scenery in the world (Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone etc), it is also covered in identikit cold dull strip malls and characterless ‘towns’. If you do not believe me, use Google Maps and switch to street view and just ‘drive’ around. You’ll be shocked at how vast stretches of the country look like a third world city suburb. Wide dull streets peppered with fast foot outlets, second hand car dealerships, nail salons and tax offices – little else.
Meanwhile, here in the UK, we have clean pleasant characterful villages and (some!) towns, not to mention our beautiful lush countryside that makes life worth living.
Take that away, and this country will become a characterless wasteland, like middle America or suburban Libya. And such a reality will render the very point of actually living and moving to the countryside pointless, and that will devastate the local economy. And for those who LIVE in the countryside, you will know that employment is almost 100% and crime, almost 0%. Why? Because the structure of the community is such that thanks to the ‘trickle down’ effect of robust hierarchical economics (land owners employ skilled tradesmen employ apprentices who spend money locally) there is little chance of people falling through the cracks.
Those who live in the countryside will know exactly what I mean.”
Ethical dilemma
In 1992, after reading about a short story competition in the Palo Alto Weekly, I started work on a screenplay predicting a devastating (nuclear) attack on New York city. The whole concept was based on my observations of US culture over my humble, (at the time) timid and reserved English upbringing. I felt that if I as a citizen of a nation at the ‘centre’ of the world was shocked at US culture, how would those further to the East or with similar more reserved values react and how long would they put up with it, even if such differences were not intended to cause intentional harm? In a nutshell, I felt an event on the scale of (or greater) than 9/11 was going to happen years before anyone had ever discussed such a concept – Tom Clancy included.
Well, unfortunately, my prediction came true, even if on a lesser scale – relatively speaking.
I put a considerably amount of effort into what became a short story called The Party. And to date, have never profited from it, despite the fact many others have profitted from 9/11 itself. My story was written prior to the event and so does not exploit it and I would never do so.
As per other short stories I may complete, am considering asking those who enjoy my stories to pay a small fee if they desire. In the case of The Party, I was thinking of (say) $1.75 or a £1.00. Or perhaps a little more and donate a % to a charity.
What do you think? Please comment below.
Eyes Wide Open
“Regarding social commentary, Kubrick has been noted for the recurring theme of concern with the over-mechanization of society which, in its attempt to create a safe environment, creates an artificial sterility that breeds the very evils it tries to exclude.”
I hadn’t planned on posting this, but whilst catching part of Full Metal Jacket on TV I started reading the Wikipedia entry on Stanley Kubrick and came across the aforementioned quote that bares much in common with one of the main themes of this blog. Namely the concern that politically correctness, (misused/ridiculous) ‘human rights’ and health and safety laws, dumbed down media, robotic call centres manned by clueless artificially friendly automatons, council jobsworths entrapping the middle classes and social media and other ‘inhuman’ concepts devoid of five senses will have the opposite effect their well meaning OR bitter creators intend. And the recent riots in the UK validate this, as does the gradual collapse of ethical dignified society, in particular in the UK. And I am not even bringing up the main symptom of all this, stress! Life is just so complicated now.
Fight back club: Follow the wise.
Re Kubrick, I have found each one of his films, in particular 2001, Eyes Wide Shut, Dr. Strangeglove and AI* to be so intellectually and conceptually beyond any other that there is no comparison with the mainstream. The man was a unique and talented visionary genius who you either get or don’t, or get later as you mature. Example, when first seeing 2001 as a child, I found it boring. A fine argument to constantly seek enlightenment, because that way, you appreciate more and more of what life has to offer!
*A JV with Spielberg, but Kubrick’s influence was everywhere.
DEFY
!! INCOMPLETE POST !!
Even prior to seeing the Mad Max movies, I always felt that within my lifetime, we would face an apocalypse. And before I type another character, as I recently commented on a newspaper story, am willing to bet that deep down, a good majority of you feel the same way now, even the conservative of you or those who are too young to remember how terrifying it could be during the height of the cold war.
I received a lot of ‘Likes’ for my comment – a bit worrying!
What is surprising today is the complete lack of advice on how to survive the downturn, crazy unpredictable weather and resultant rocketing cost of food and fuel – the backbones of a strong economy and security against slipping down Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. The reasons for this lack of help are obvious to those of us who bare little goodwill to large corporations – it isn’t good for business!
So, here’s a great way to survive and maintain a relatively comfortable, more secure (sustainable!) and independent lifestyle:
- Don’t buy prepackaged foods – they cost three times or more what it costs to make it yourself. And yes, it all adds up.
- Unplug and/or giveaway/sell as many white good, such as extra freezers. Watch you fuel bill plummet! How many other appliances or gadgets are drawing power 100% of the time?!
- Bicycle to anywhere you cannot reach by car or on foot.
- Switch from a monthly airtime contract on your mobile phone to a sim only plan, where you can opt out with a month’s notice.
- If you have the energy and live near one, apply for an allotment – great if you have kids.
- If you do have the budget, are or have an architect – and handy skills, build your own house, with one south facing side constructed almost entirely of glass (to let in sunlight), and the other, a thick stone wall to act as insulation. This will reduce the need for artificial heating or cooling. Many experimental houses like this already exist – some near Oxford, England, others in Arizona.
- Do as much as you can to disconnect from ‘the grid’ and as per your mobile phone, avoid any long term contractual commitments. Rich? Install a huge solar panel on your roof. (Follow @lifemachine on Twitter if you have an interest in matters green associated with practical sustainable living.)
- Stay away from any processed foods and additives that will make you ill at some point in the future just when you are needed.
- Don’t ever forget that from the second you were born, you were for sale. But you know that, right?
- More coming!
Out of the blue
Being someone who always (always) likes to know the very truth, how things work, why they happen (or don’t), I have taken great interest in the mysteries associated with the tragic day that was 9/11. I don’t believe in conspiracies (although they do of course exist, sometimes perhaps for the good of the good?), but I have, until about 5 minutes ago, been interested in what exactly bought down WT7, and why the BBC reported it’s destruction before it actually occurred. Not to mention the lack of one single photograph, home video or CCTV footage of the aircraft that hit the Pentagon.
Well, minutes ago, whilst reading about The Guardian’s interesting project to document what people were doing when they learned of the attacks, I came across this…
Julian Borger, diplomatic editor
I was watching TV in the Guardian’s Washington office. A colleague dropped me at the Pentagon. As I ran around the building I came to a huge burning hole. The Latino gardeners, who had seen the Boeing 757 fly straight into the building, stood there completely stunned.
Like most of you I am sure, I have read and watched thousands of (level headed) articles and reports on 9/11, and not one, not one! has dealt with these mysteries in a credible manner, therefore leaving some of us with doubts that we are being told the whole truth. But when a journalist from a left wing publication of all things discloses something like this, a good portion of such doubts are quashed.
I think you know what I mean.
This still doesn’t explain what happened to WT7, but if you would like some creative common sense input from this blogger, it really was demolished by one of it’s occupants to protect sensitive materials inside that may otherwise get blown all over the city like the papers from the twin towers – or taken by looters or foreign agents from within the damaged building. No conspiracy, just precaution in the same way the stealth helicopter that crashed during the mission to kill Bin Laden himself was destroyed by the US special opps team to prevent such advanced military technology from falling into enemy hands.
So, there you go, after all this time – head scratching, research, chatting with people and all else, a random paragraph in The Guardian unexpectedly brings it all home. Why? Because I trust the source and the witnesses quoted.
The moral of the story? With patience, cakes get baked and questions answered.
Fight back club: Give it time.
For those wondering what my views are on the whole 9/11 event. To quote that setting on the world’s largest social networking site, “It’s complicated.” However, I did predict it 7 or 8 years before that terrible day. The reasons 9/11 happened are also outlined clearly in the aforementioned short story and as I type this almost 20 years since being ‘inspired’ to write The Party, I stand by the concepts discussed then. An analysis and prediction you understand, not an attempt to be judgemental. In simple summary: Vast differences between Eastern and Western culture. Period.
With regards to all the conspiracy theories, of course, it would be impossible for something so daring and complex to be pulled off (in the West) without one person squeaking, but ‘allowing’ one or more components of the attacks to occur for various reasons to do with that great lumbering oil tanker that is humanity’s destiny is a possibility I have entertained based on events decades prior to 9/11, where a heinous ’own goal’ (or ‘false flag’) act has been carried out. Oh, I just don’t know! But do you? 
Why the surprise?
Since starting out in business, I have constantly questioned why the stock market exists, and more recently, the other non tactile concept, currency speculation. Before anyone starts thinking “oh hear we go, an anti-capitalist rant”, I am a keen Thatcherite (oh we so need her now!) many of the most successful smaller but viable businesses, such as Dyson and John Lewis (both superb British companies) are private or employee owned, and a lot more ethical and common sense based than the huge lumbering planet destroying public companies out there whose policy and corporate ethics is linked to the nasty laws they have to obey on behalf of their stockholders. Such laws ENCOURAGE them to get up to all sorts of maleficence, from selling sensitive customer data to drilling and spilling oil wherever they can. All because growth (on a non expanding spherical planet) MUST continue – ad infinitum! What a ridiculous concept! I know intellectuals do get annoying by saying this, but we do really allow some very dumb and greedy people into positions of far too much power on this increasingly frustrated planet.
As I type this, unsurprisingly, the global economy is in turmoil, effecting people and organisations who have done little or nothing to contribute to the problems – including many businesses, pensioners and the (already) poor.
When in the USA, (as mentioned elsewhere on this blog or in former pre-blogging broadcast emails to my colleagues in the US ), I highlighted the fact that by owning stock in a company, one creates a conflict of interest in friendships. a) If I am working on a secret project and a friend owns stock in a competitor, that puts said friendship under strain. Yes, friend could work at the competitor itself, but a single individual can own stock in multiple competitors. b) Related, knowing someone with stock in your own company would make it easy to inadvertently provide them insider information – therefore breaking the law.
Like currency trading and other speculative economic concepts, I just find the whole stock market thing a bit like SMS text messaging and Twitter, pointless and achievable using alternative more robust methods. If it is so great, why are so many Scandinavian countries that do not rely on a stock market driven economy so successful, happy, clean and green?
Fight back club: Only invest in the tactile. So hop in the Tardis and buy some gold at 2005 rates!
I have written this post very very quickly and it needs a big edit when time allows. FYI, for the last few years, I have been taking note of how many people I meet, talk to or just observe and concluded that only about 10% of those who read my blog will even agree with it. And I find that very very worrying, not for personal or ego reasons, but because if that is the case, then the West is definitely doomed. Ironically, the increasing number of people (of all classes) taking up allotments to grow their foodstuffs is evidence that subconsciously, those of all opinions sense deep down that something apocalyptic comes this way…
Unfair
Why is it that hard working (even if ‘illegal’) workers who come here to improve the quality of life for their overseas families living in flood ravaged nations, commit no crimes or terror, are then arrested and their employers fined, yet hate preachers living off the state and doing nothing to contribute to our economy or community are allowed to continue doing so? I will tell you why, there is no oil in Bangladesh. And it is this sort of duplicitous behaviour by the authorities in the West that renders all the talk by politicians (of all parties) as tosh.
Fight back club: Write to your MP and include a profile of the polite hard working (respectful!) workers at your local curry house.
Web 4.0 – Reality Optimisation?
They say the Universe is mainly made up of empty space – as is matter itself, with vast distances (relatively speaking) existing between the electrons and other stuff, despite any illusionary sensation of tactility.
Well, likewise with the way we exist as humans. There is a huge amount of empty space in our lives. A wasteful existence that requires optimisation – to use a software engineering term!
- Our cars sit idle for 75% of the day. (That is a guess.)
- Our homes and offices sit empty for 50% of the (24 hour) day.
- Even our computers are only using about 10% of their processing power on average while we are actually using them, unless one is a pro photographer or video editor. (Something SETI chose to exploit a while back.)
- UPDATE: A colleague mentioned lawn mowers! They sit around for almost 95% of each month doing nothing. What if we shared them? Of course, the effect on sales by producers if consumers shared would be catastrophic. Further, the machines we share would wear out quicker. When resources do run low, we may have no choice though and be forced to build things to last longer.
Recently, several startups have launched ventures that now offer a way to harness all this ‘whitespace’ in our lives:
- Airbnb allows you to rent that empty accommodation while you’re elsewhere. (Albiet, fairly high class accommodation, suited to vacation rentals. But I do recall there was a couch surfing venture somewhere for those seeking a more humble abode!)
- Not using your car? GetAround solves that one! Self driving cars, the most reliable developed by Google, will turn cars into taxis, a very efficient way to travel – and most importantly, less stressful. Other than the fare or being stuck in traffic when due for an appointment, I think we can all agree that taxis reduce transport stress a great deal!
Which begs the question, what other opportunities are there to harness empty space, such as:
- Wireless spectrum
- Parking spaces
- The human mind! How much time do we actually spend thinking? What about tapping into our minds when we’re asleep? (The ethics of hooking our minds up to some remote system for discussion elsewhere.)
Etc!
Fight back club: What will you optimise today?
I chose the term ‘Web 4.0′ because each shift in the use of the web has attacked a specific issue. Although Reality Optimisation itself does not necessarily relate to the web exclusively, as the above examples prove, it is likely that web technology will aid in making our lives more efficient. Outsource to the machine!
UPDATE: 26 May 2011 – GetAround have won the TechCrunch Disrupt awards. Awesome!
Lego Sinclair ZX-81 dock I built in 1981
Posting this in reference to this post on Engadget that features a far more sophisticated creation.
The ZX-81 shown above is currently in our office and by re-fitting a resistor I removed to fix another gadget in the 1980s, it should still function
I also built a functioning lego bedside alarm clock (pics yet to be scanned in) and a hovercraft, although the latter cheated – it had wheels! Well, I was only about 7 or 8 at the time and yet to acquire an electric motor powerful enough to produce the necessary lift!
In 1982 I won a Sinclair Spectrum in a competition to design a computer of the future. Later, a huge lightening bolt hit our house travelling down the TV antenna, arcing across to the electricity cables and destroying ALL our electronic gear including the Spectrum, our new colour TV and my JVC/Sony/Technics HiFi. With the insurance payout, I bought a BBC Micro 32K and learned 6502 assembler. And that dear reader, is how we started the company!
Pre-sensitisation
A few years ago, I started work on a timeline based graph that presented the parallels between the plots of various Hollywood films and current or potential future real world events. Whilst it is obvious that the Bond movies and similar productions are designed to draw upon current affairs for entertainment and light weight political purposes, a specific movie released in 2003 raised a few red flags as I sat watching it, despite the preposterous plot. Although a Science Fiction movie, there were craftily inserted references to actual political events.
That film was The Core. A big budget creation that appeared to be a propaganda vehicle, even if the motives were sound. While I will discus my observations on The Core later, the horrific tornadoes that have hit the US recently have highlighted the plot of another movie release just a year later, namely, The Day After Tomorrow.
© 2004 Twentieth Century Fox
© 2011 Us?
The film features extreme weather events, including a large number of tornadoes, unlike anything that had occured before, just as is happening today in the US, even if on a smaller scale. Likewise, the other weather events the film portrayed have also occurred since the film was released – again, on a lesser scale.
What raises a flag is the producers of The Day After Tomorrow were Fox, an entity with right wing leanings.
Some speculated at the time that this film was made with one purpose only, to exaggerate the effects of climate change, such that when they began to occur in ‘real life’ (as is happening now – consider the temperature fluctuations in April here in the UK), the public would not react in such a concerned manner. And it appears to be working.
Scientists have been very accurate in predicting such changes in our weather (including those here in the UK) and it is obvious to anyone who pays attention to politics and the news, that entities with right leaning interests tend to protect their old fashioned ways when it comes to corporate interests, and in this case, we are talking about carbon fuels. Beyond lacking the intellect and imagination to consider any other path, they do know full well that the world is undergoing speedy uncontrollable climatic change, but don’t want us to upset their investments.
And that is why that movie was made. Any film with such a huge budget that lacks the sort of intellectual credibility (The Core is the other example), has to be looked upon with suspicion. Why else would someone make it? An oscar?
People need to realise this and not allow their feelings to be watered down and consider the short and long term effects any human made climate change is going to have on our food supply, human migration patterns and therefore, economic stability. The current rise in price of basic food stuffs, such as rice and flour, is directly caused by climate change. If you doubt the price rises, ask any restaurant owner, or check your supermarket bill of a year ago, prior to the fires in Russia, the floods in Australia, China – etc.
It is times like this when governments and financially strong corporations need to make Manhattan Project level investments in next generation solar, battery technology and infrastructure, with the objective that globally viable clean energy generation solutions are ready for introduction by 2016. Yes, five years, the same amount of time it took to realise the atomic bomb, and the length of World War 2, a period during which humanity was forced to invest in and succeeded in triggering a speed of technological change that has never occurred since.
Fight back club: Get proactive by making lifestyle changes, such as choosing more sustainable and pollution free products and services. My employer is doing their part by developing @lifemachine. And we power our servers using 100% solar energy.
Due to the importance of the subject, have taken 20 minutes out of work to post this. When time allows, I will move it to a permanent page and add my observations on the script of the movie, The Core, that paralleled events in the Middle East at the time. I would also like to emphasise that there is no absolute evidence the tornados in the US this week were caused by man made climate change, there was a similar event in the 1970s, however, the increasing incidences of severe unstable weather world-wide does raise yet another red flag. And yes, the sun may also be responsible, but not entirely, and it also offers us potential salvation.
The symptoms of uncertainty
Various commentators have made the point that the media hype over the events at the Fukushima nuclear power station is unjustified in view of the thousands of victims of the earthquake and tsunami, whilst to date, the number of casualties from the reactor incident is in single digits.
That is not the issue. The deaths caused by the quake or tsunami were an act of nature that man was powerless to prevent. And it is tough to say it, but once the elderly and young bereaved of their care givers are helped, the long term effects of the natural disaster will fade, to be replaced by re-building and new hope.
People are worried about the power plant due to the uncertainty associated with radiation. Unlike most other threats, not only is it invisible (in all senses of the word), but there has been a history of cover ups, confusion and misleading information on both sides each time there is a nuclear accident anywhere in the world, from Windscale to Chernobyl.
As you sit reading this now, no matter where you are located, how do you know how much radiation you are being exposed to, whether it is natural radon or a leak somwhere? You’ll know if there is a gas leak – you’ll smell it, you’ll know if there’s a fire breaking out in the room next door – you’ll see the smoke if the alarms don’t alert you first, you’ll know there’s a virus spreading because your friends and family will suddenly become ill, you’ll know the weather is changing because you have a thermometer somewhere in your life and can look outside, and you’ll know there’s a tsunami on the way – you’ll hear the screaming and sirens.
But you will have no idea if a particle of plutonium from reactor 3 has entered your body until it’s too late.
And that is the problem. Uncertainty.
Accurate information is hard to come by due to special interests/politics, genuine confusion and technical limitations on site caused by the catastrophic damage to the plant.
Fight back club: a) Globally crowd source radiation detection equipment, monitor it, and act accordingly. b) Reduce your reliance on ‘the grid’
Related: Am I the only one to have noticed increasing incidences of cancer amongst younger people – including ones own friends and family? Is this nuclear leaks over the last few decades?, plastics?, local radon?, overconsumption of processed foods and chemicals in contemporary life? All of the above? Who knows.
@lifemachine
We can do it!
I know, the Daily Mail is looked upon as being published and read by a load of grumpy old farts. But the truth is, some of the issues this blog – and more recently the DM – have been harking on about for a while are a serious threat to the (genuine) freedom and sense of honor, respect and trust that goes with being sentient.
Today, the DM is claiming success in three areas that I have been attempting to fight not only on this blog, but behind the scenes too. (Have you ever read one of my letters contesting an unjustified ‘penalty charge’? This is evidence that the Internet and our democracy CAN be used as a force for good – just as long as enough people with a grounded sense of right and wrong get up and do something.
Yes, I would rather stick to writing about Android VS iOS or other technical and design matters that are close to my heart, but that is easy. What is hard is to stand up to authority when that authority is getting away with behavior that causes innocent hard working people considerable stress – and a feeling they do not have anyone to support / ‘be there’ for them. Yes, there are far more serious ways in which a human can suffer, but if people are constantly battling against a flawed (and nefarious) system here, they won’t have time to put aside time for more worthy causes, such as helping out in a school in Africa or an after work charity.
Much more on this in due course over my lifetime – the next two issues being the government’s attempt to sell off some of the UK’s forests and the embarrassing and economically damaging state of our transport infrastructure. The latter can be solved through good design, sound ethical management and well motivated staff.
Fight back club: Fight back!
