Odds and Sods

No sooner do Toyota have an unexplained bug in their cars acceleration, than we get this classic from Wired:

More than 100 drivers in Austin, Texas found their cars disabled or the horns honking out of control, after an intruder ran amok in a web-based vehicle-immobilization system normally used to get the attention of consumers delinquent in their auto payments.

Police with Austin’s High Tech Crime Unit on Wednesday arrested 20-year-old Omar Ramos-Lopez, a former Texas Auto Center employee who was laid off last month, and allegedly sought revenge by bricking the cars sold from the dealership’s four Austin-area lots.

“We initially dismissed it as mechanical failure,” says Texas Auto Center manager Martin Garcia. “We started having a rash of up to a hundred customers at one time complaining. Some customers complained of the horns going off in the middle of the night. The only option they had was to remove the battery.”

This illustrates another of the downsides of simple mass interconnectness without robust security and risk mitigation systems (a similar example is computer trading systems that go into a downward sell spiral).

I recall reading a Sci Fi story many years ago (70's) about a "wired" world in which a country guy with an old petrol engined, non computerised car drives into town and is nearly killed by enraged townies who se him as eco-unfriendly, but then something goes wrong with The Grid in a levee flood and all their electric cars stop with them stuck inside, and they get drowned.

The dream is to hook up all cars so they can speed seamlessly along and optimise traffic flows. The reality, unless systems are very secure and resilient, will be massive pile ups and carnage.

It is clearly becoming traditional at SXSW to have an Interview Keynote that everyone loves to hate, a process that is affectionately known as Lacyration. This year's tag team were Havas's Umair Haque and Twitter's Ev Williams. Just see here and here for the articles - but read the comments for a more balanced view than just the Twitter faithful.

But of course, this one was all predictable, as the chart above shows. Today's competition is to "spot the middle ground". Answers on a postcard.....

Update - Umair Haque's comments over here talks about a bigger picture than you can get in 140 characters.

Paul Carr is mellowing! Yes, dear readers - he has written a well thought out post on the UK's new Digital Economy Bill. Not only that, he actually read the Bill! I haven't in detail*, so I'm just going to cut and paste Paul's stuff. As he points out, some of the huffing and puffing about Draconian Crackdowns on Free Spirits is somewhat overstated:

For a start, the first point of contention – the compilation of a persistent offenders list, and the potential banning of them from accessing the Internet – isn’t quite as unfair as it sounds. Despite Doctorow’s claim that “your entire family [can] be cut off from the net if anyone who lives in your house is accused of copyright infringement, without proof or evidence or trial”, there are actually multiple points at which evidence comes into play, and the accused file-swapper is given a chance to defend themselves. The bill requires the creation of an independent tribunal body to hear claims of unfairness arising from the new laws, and alleged infringers have not one but two rights of appeal to the tribunal. With each alleged breach, the new law demands that the ISP send a letter to the subscriber putting the allegations and the evidence to them.

Only once a significant number of breaches have been alledged (the drafters of the bill suggest 50) will the subscriber be added to the persistent offenders list. Again, they will be notified. Only at this point can the copyright owner appeal to the court – using a law that has been around for 36 years – to get the name and address of the offender. Even then, though, they won’t be taken to court. Instead, the copyright owner has to send the subscriber yet another letter (this will be their 52nd) warning them that legal action is imminent if they don’t stop. It’s only then that legal action will be taken, leading to a possible fine and – only at the extreme end of the scale – their Internet access being disconnected.

And, as he points out, much of it is just confirming what already exists:

Yes, the courts will have the power to require ISPs to block sites that egregiously host copyrighted files. But they can only do so if the site involved has refused to remove the copyrighted files – a last resort against foreign file lockers who ignore British court injunctions. More importantly it’s also a power that the British courts have had since the 2002 E-Commerce Directive Regulations (with ISP’s being similarly liable for inaction): the new legislation simply creates a DMCA-style process for making take-down requests easier to issue.

As Paul points out, a lot of the opposition to the Bill is coming from people without any intention of actually reading it (the "numpties" who so frustrated me last year when there were public debates about the Digital Britain report). this does not help debate, nor do the inflamed headlines from those who oppose it on ideological grounds (The Grauniad has been pretty poor in its articles on all this in my opinion).

But the thing I still don't get is why Her Majesty's Government is so desperate to get this through in the dog days of the administration. As Paul says, this is the sort of thing we must get right, so surely we can wait until after the May elections?.

* Haven't read the latest British one but had to get our heads around the DMCA, WIPO and various bits of EU legislation a few years back. Exciting reading it is not

The nursery rhyme Solomon Grundy as applied to Google Buzz (if you want to see our more serious analysis of what went wrong, go to Google Buzz - Anatomy of a Trainwreck in Slow Motion):

The Lament of Google Buzz (with apologies to Solomon Grundy)

Google Buzz, hey!
Launched on Tuesday,
Hyped all Wednesday,
Concerns by Thursday
F*ck You on Friday,
Blogstorm Saturday,
Retreat by Sunday,
Buried by Monday?
And that is the Story of Google Buzz, nay?

Well, maybe not buried by tomorrow, but Buzz is probably holed below the waterline now - this is not going to be a mass market service as it has neither the functionality nor the trusted reputation for mass market adoption.

I'd say it was at best a Friendfeed killer, if Friendfeed was alive.

Last night David Cameron spoke at the TED event, in London. It was in the stream dealing with Behavioural Psychology and Economics (I covered it here) and his talk was essentially a thesis in how this may be used by a future administration. My notes during the talk:

He started off very well - "politics is showbiz for ugly people"

Then moved to the first point - the central debate of the 21st century is..... global public debt - $32 trillion and counting. So how do we make things better without money?

- Give power to the people
- Go with the grain of human nature
- Use digital technology

There was then the regulatory discussion about the view that people get happier until income hits $60,000 (there must be a UK equivalent, quoth he) and then increased happiness tails off. He actually said that the differences between the middle class and the very rich therefore didn't matter, and took the view that the critical thing was to help poorer people who earn less than this to earn more. He didn't seem to get that if he did that, all that happens is that the "$60,000" number will go up, because its a relative difference.

I also think he's wrong re rich not causing envy among the middle class, but there are clearly Tories who want to believe this one.

There were quite a few other references to Happiness Theory, Behavioural Economics, especially Nudge etc

He also reckoned we have gone from pre-bureaucratic ages local power to industrial age, central power (bureaucratic stage) and we are now moving to ..... People Power.

As part of this, we were going to get Transparency, Accountability and Choice

Also, all government contracts above £20k were to be published online. I delight to see what will happen when We The People see how much they are spending on consultants

He then showed examples of potential mashups of government data, with true Government 2.0 fervour ...which prompted the first concerned Twts:

[Cameron] reveals he plans to publish live crime maps. Won't this lead to vigilantism, panic,fear?

Kevin Anderson has live blogged the whole thing over here.

So, All Good Stuff - Happiness, Nudge, Equality, Government 2.0 - what's not to like?

Here's what:

Firstly. he is picking and choosing his Behavioural Economics - one person picked him up on too much focus on Choice, pointing out that BE also shows too much choice is bad.

Secondly, he seemed to believe that moderation will be done by We The People being vigilant - as questioners pointed out, thats not the way it works now so why would it work online - "the only people who have the time to do this are the media, so we will have rule by media mob" as one questioner put it. (This by the way had many social mediarati grumpy when I twittered it, but I think the worriers may have a point, watching the way Social Media Mob Rule works)

Thirdly, he was dreadfully optimistic (naive?) about the sorts of things people will get up to with all the public's data out there - his approach to all the questions about how to control cheating behaviour, miscreants etc was to believe all people were Good Citizens at heart and to play the "shame on you for believing people are bad" card.

Fourthly, and most worryingly, overall I got the very strong impression that they (the Tories) do not have the inclination to take on the financial sector to get any of the $32 Trillion back. He made no reference to the Robin Hood Tax video that had just been shown before (see above YouTube video), suggesting that 0.05% tax on bank transactions could pay back a lot of what we had given them and solve global warming and poverty to boot. His thesis seemed to boil down to the approach that we should do all this low cost Government 2.0 / BE stuff to keep us happy in our new-found poverty while we rendered the loot unto the Bankers.

In fact, Government 2.0 looked like it was just a way of introducing Feudal 2.0 and BE will Nudge us towards Happiness, which will be the new opiate of the masses. Get ready to tug your virtual forelock to the New Barons Rothschild

(By the way, I am fairly apolitical - "don't vote, it only encourages them" seems as good a motto as any these days, anarchism without bombs works for me - but I got a very strong Brave New World feeling last night, and it would worry me, except of course I believe in the Wisdom of the People to resist it......ummmm )

Speaking of voting, by the way - it looks like Goldman Sachs rigged up a huge campaign to vote against the Robin Hood Tax proposal.

So Jason Calacanis pulls a prank:

On his Twitter starting Tuesday night Wednesday morning, a few hours before Apple's scheduled announcement, Calacanis said he had been a "beta tester" for the then-undisclosed iPad. He also said....

- That it was powered by solar panels.
- That it included a TiVO-esque personal video recorder.
- A built-in high-definition TV tuner.
- A fingerprint reader for security.
- Thumb-driven mouse gestures.
- Wireless internet through Verizon and AT&T.
- A custom version of the cheesy, decidedly low-rez Facebook game Farmville in which you shook the tablet to plant seeds and tilt it to "spread water around."
- Facial recognition.
- Wireless electric charging.

And the Tech Media jumped at the bait.... some notables:

- TechCrunch's CrunchGear, for example, wrote that Calacanis might have "spoiled" Apple CEO Steve Jobs' big speech.
- AOL's Joystiq, a blog Calacanis himself started, uncritically echoed the Los Angeles entrepreneur
- CNN/Money was the worst offender, completely rewriting their article so it looked like a history of the prank rather than something they once took very seriously.

Well, thats sorted the sheep from the goats - again.

(Puts on lofty tone) I have refused to join the iPad hype, but this story (and this one) were too good to miss. But the lesson is clear - keep far away from Tech Media journos at feeding frenzy time. Why some of these people are still employed - and have audiences - is beyond me. But then, the Link Economy is all about being famous, not being competent

Bill Gates did a rather good Mark Antony impression with his recent discussion about Google, market dominance and China. NYT Interview:

Is Google a monopolist? “I wouldn’t call anyone a monopolist,” replied Mr. Gates, who has frequently been the target of that epithet over the years. He went on to say that historically companies that become “hyper-successful” invite government antitrust scrutiny, and he placed Google in that small, elite group of technology companies: AT&T, I.B.M. and Microsoft. Welcome to the club, Google. “If governments don’t care, that’s a bad sign,” Mr. Gates said.

And on That China Thing.....

Mr. Gates declared himself unimpressed and a bit perplexed by Google’s recent threat to drop its search business in China to protest Chinese censorship of search after attacks apparently intended to spy on Gmail accounts of human-rights activists. “They’ve done nothing and gotten a lot of credit for it,” Mr. Gates said.

One may or may not agree with the laws in China, he said, but nearly all countries have some controversial laws or policies, including the United States. “What point are they making?” Mr. Gates asked. “Now, if Google ever chooses to pull out of the United States, then I’d give them credit.”

Mr Gates still moonlighting as Chief Microsoftie

Clay Shirky recently wrote an analysis of why women struggle in the enterprise/executive role. It's quite strongly worded, so worth a read but may have some people gnashing their teeth. Anyway, one of his points was that :

I’m not concerned that women don’t engage in enough building of self-confidence or self-esteem. I’m worried about something much simpler: not enough women have what it takes to behave like arrogant self-aggrandizing jerks.

One of those, errrm, "self aggrandizing jerk" skills is speaking out in public, something which nearly all the professional women tell me they don't like. However, it is a necessity to be able to project your ideas. Thus when Laura North told me last night at the soft launch of our Innovation Manifesto (of which more later) that she was organising a soiree for women to work through this public speaking angst, I felt I had to blog it. Here is the session:

Does the idea of speaking in front of an audience make you nervous? 'Speaking out - public speaking made easy' will show you how to feel comfortable speaking in public.

Whether you want to make a presentation, contribute to a group discussion or just ask a question at a conference, we'll give you some easy ways to help you share your thoughts and ideas effectively.

Speakers include Katie Streten, Head of Digital Strategy at design agency Imagination, Christian Heilmann from Yahoo!, and Dave Bell from Merrill Lynch, who has been helping young women in Tower Hamlets make public presentations. All the speakers share the same aim of helping participants to communicate in a more relaxed and informal way.

The event is open to all, but women are especially encouraged to attend and subjects include speaking in public from a woman's perspective.

Drinks will follow the event.

Its on Wednesday, February 10, 2010 from 6:30 PM - 8:30 PM (GMT). You can sign up here on Eventbrite

Us Brits know only too well that our US cousins and many others to whom English is their first language but wot don't speak it proper don't "get" irony and sarcasm, and take us literally in our texts and twts, taking what to us was intended as a humorous aside as a cutting comment and getting very upset.

So, A US firm has come up with an ingenious solution to the very real problem of sarcasm in text being miunderstood – and has designed a new item of punctuation. Torygraph:

The SarcMark, as it has been named, is designed to be used in the same way as an exclamation or question mark. Anyone concerned that the irony of their email or text message might not be appreciated by its recipient can use the symbol to close their sentence, thereby avoiding awkward misunderstandings.

The symbol – a dot inside a single spiral line – can be installed onto any PC running Windows 7, XP or Vista, as well as Macs and Blackberry mobile devices. It can then be used in Word documents, instant messenger conversations, Outlook email and other programmes, just by pressing Ctrl and the full stop button. The Michigan company behind the SarcMark have applied for a patent to protection their invention

A patent for a bloody squiggle that looks like an @ with a . on it, and a charge of $1.99 to download it! One could almost be sarcastic about that

Actually, I've a better idea - how about using the "pull tongue" icon like we always used to in The Olde Days. Open Sauce and al that............

Update - the Gorgeous Liz Varley reminds me that the French invented one in the late 1800's.

Update - I put up the video which I found on YouTube.... could the lads just possibly be taking the p*ss - and oh dear, someone takes it seriously

Google's decision to (essentially - its not over till the fat lady sings) pull out of China was, we believe, based mainly on RealEkonomik considerations rather than purely moral (as an aside, the various opinions on this really separated out the media sheep* from the clear eyed goats) but this has every possibility of sparking off, butterfly wing flapping like, some interesting RealPolitiks. Consider these fault lines:

- Google has not been the only western brand playing the Chinese Game (kowtow to obtain access to the cash) but is the only one to exit quoting a moral stance. And this will echo. Millions, nay billions of dreamy OECD citizens (read: wealthy and impressionable consumers) are now up for grabs for the unprincipled to attempt to tempt their principles - and cash - away from companies still in China.

- This episode makes clear the amount of Cyberwar going on in China, but that is just the tip of a global iceberg - and anyone who believes that (i) those companies active in China weren't aware of it going in and (ii) their own governments aren't aware either are - well, as naive as some of the journalists that feed them their daily pap. But, this action means tat some of the murky waters around that iceberg will start to clarify.

- China (and Iran) clearly have learned that co-ordinated, assertive National "Corporate PR" is a useful tool - other countries have surely noticed

- Around boardrooms globally there must be the soft popping sound sound of expletives bouncing off the walls as it becomes clear that ethics and morality (If Google can do this, why can't.....) are intruding further into corporate decision making.

- China was not the only country where Google censorship is going on - France, Italy and even the UK (if the Digital Economy bill goes through as is) have their censoring fingers in the Googlepie. (And did someone say Patriot Act....) Will we see similar principled pullouts from these countries by Google (very unlikely) or greater citizen pressure to remove censorship (a bit more likely) - but whatever way, people are now aware of this issue like never before.

We are living in Interesting Times, as the Chinese say.

Morality and RealPolitik have never been comfortable together, but this action of Google's could be a major spark to global RealPolitik - because of the very RealEkonomiks involved. It will also highlight (for a while, anyway) the uncomfortable Chinese reality that you can get rampant economic growth while being neither democratic or a free society. "Animal Farm" was written in 1945 as a parody of Stalinism in the 30's when it was worshipped by many in the West - who has the bottle to write the Chinese version while its all happening?

Speaking personally, while I doubt the decision to exit was mainly moral, kudos anyway to Google for doing the right thing. (It very interesting to see that Brin, and to a lesser extent Page, are being cast as Google's moral compass right now vs Schmidt and the Korporat Apparatchiks). As I've tried to note above, it potentially sets a spark under a number of other unpleasant trends for people to become aware f - and take action on)

*Re: Media Sheep - As far as moral wishy-washiness goes, my favourite was this from The Grauniad yesterday:

As someone who agreed with Google's reasoning when it entered China, I also support this move. If it cannot operate here in accordance with its global standards, it should leave.

...and no doubt said organ will agree with Whatever Google Does Next