Tag: saas

R.I.P. Information Hwy

by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

Your phone is a tool you’re using, or a tool that’s using you…

I’m watching The Politician on Netflix while working out. The scene is on a teen and mom in their kitchen, arguing about which state senator to vote for in the upcoming New York election.

Teen is a first-time voter, just 18. She’s going to vote for the 24-yr old male candidate on the Green ticket, running solely on the climate platform, with no political or real work experience. She’s disgusted with the middle-age female incumbent, virtually unchallenged in every election the last 20 yrs, until now.

“Boomer,” the teen mocks her mother’s choice of the older incumbent. “The world is gonna end in 10 years, Mom.”

“I am barely a boomer, okay?” the mom defends. “So don’t throw that shit at me,” she says. “And the world is not going to end in 10 years, Jayne!” She starts listing all she does for her daughter — the vegan cooking, the composting, and even the hyper-vigilant recycling her child insists on. “And still, I’m the problem, according to you.”

“Not you, Mom. People your age.”

Watching this scene unfold, I feel my body tense as I run on the machine. I AM her mother’s age.

“Let me tell ya something, Jayne. People your age think you know everything and you are fucking naive. When I was your age, I thought I knew everything too.”

“We’re not naive, Mom. We’re informed. You had, what, like two newspapers, three networks. I’ve got a SUPERCOMPUTER in my pocket.”

She is, of course, referring to her cellphone, and, in fact, showing me how naive this teen really is.

Unfortunately, Mom didn’t come back at Jayne. Mom doesn’t know (nor the writers of the show apparently) that the SUPERCOMPUTER in both their pockets, well, isn’t informing them of anything but what they already believe, and about things they likely want. So, in effect, it is MANIPULATING this ignorant, yet rather arrogant child, (and many others) into believing they have a SUPERCOMPUTER in their cellphone.

The cellphone you all carry around, (as I don’t have a smartphone, so really, it is all of you), isn’t INFORMING you, it’s ‘recommending’ you read, watch, buy, and even think about what advertisers on the internet want you to.

Today’s internet is NOT unlimited access to unfettered information like the world wide web once was. You’ll be hard-pressed to find anything through any Search engine that hasn’t been filtered through a rec system which parameters have been defined by the data you (or others like you) have willingly given.

The Netflix documentary The Great Hack makes it clear the SUPERCOMPUTER in your pocket is manipulating you, and millions like you to believe in lies through the endless onslaught of personalized advertising. Throw enough shit against a wall and some of it will stick. Russia paid Google, Facebook, Insta…etc. fortunes in ad campaigns pushing the conservative Republican agenda to get Trump elected. Twice.

The internet is now a MARKETING ENGINE to make media platforms and SaaS apps money. The cellphone, tablet, laptop you’re using has become proficient at USING YOU. Every time you log onto Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, ChatGPT, Google, they ‘scrape’ your posts, simultaneously putting ‘cookies’ on your device to follow you wherever you go on the net, and in real life.

Your mobile has an accelerometer in it tracking how fast you’re moving (so your car insurance knows how often you’re over the speed limit). GPS informs Google, Verizon, and their like where you are on the planet, revealing typical behavior patterns like when and where you shop.

Your pocket SUPERCOMPUTER collects who you talk to, what you say, what you read, watch, and frequently visit. Most every online interaction is ‘data mined.’ Trillions of posts, texts, IMs, searches, online (and in-store) credit card purchases are continually collected, stored and analyzed. Retail knows how much you make by how much you spend, and charges you more the more you make, or if your address is Beverly Hills. Not a conspiracy theory. It’s called dynamic personalized pricing.

Watching The Politician, Jayne’s mother doesn’t seem to get any of this. I’m deep into the second season and mom’s as addicted to her cellphone as her daughter. Jayne doesn’t want to believe she’s being exploited, or doesn’t really care if it’s true. She gives her data away freely, every time she signs onto the internet. She clicks, “I AGREE,” and never bothers reading the disclaimers.

Machine Learning (ML), Natural Language Process (NLP), Deep Learning, AI (LLMs, LAMs, AGIs), are all software processes used to analyze then correlate BIG DATA for patterns of behavior.

COLLABORATIVE FILTERS [à la] Wikipedia:

Collaborative filtering is a method of making automatic predictions (filtering) about the interests of a user by collecting preferences or taste information from many users (collaborating).

In other words, gathering and filtering your data from the net tells Amazon, Google and Instagram what you (and those like you) will likely buy, or what rhetoric you’ll likely buy into — believe in. Then these platforms slam you with marketing targeted AT You, NOT “For You.” They want to SELL YOU offerings and ideas supported by their affiliate marketers (like Republicans, and Russia).

Google Search prioritizes Search results by businesses that buy the most ad space on their platforms. Corps spending millions dominate the digital ad space, skewing response results for smaller businesses.

I used to get many pages of returns on any given Search a decade ago. Not anymore. Google will not give you information that they feel you don’t need (and won’t serve their agenda), based on your internet and ‘SUPERCOMPUTER’ cellphone activity and history.

My GenZ daughter and her friends are on the same page as Jayne in The Politician. They’re simply ignorant of what they’re addicted to — how their phones are manipulating them to THINK, FEEL and ACT. She is SURE that “no one is manipulating me, Mom!” She “knows” when she’s being hit with ads, and she just “ignores them.”

I call BULLSHIT.

We can’t ignore what we don’t even know is happening while we’re IMing through Instagram on our mobile.

Just IMAGINE my friend Mary’s experience:

Mary is IMing a good friend on Insta, whining about her marriage.

Instagram’s algorithms are scraping her and her friend’s IM for SENTIMENT ANALYSIS to find out where Mary might be vulnerable to purchase something…anything really, as Insta has advertisers that sell just about anything.

The next ad Mary sees on her mobile is for a singles dating site. The ad is targeted at divorcees, showing an older woman having fun with a stunning man, and the copy says, “Your last chance at true love.” In a few short sentences, the copy describes the relationship you’ll find on their site like a Cinderella story.

A while later, Mary goes on to Facebook, and YouTube, and the next series of ads she sees vacillate from singles dating sites to divorce lawyers. These ads, and recommendations for movies, articles, blogs, posts about dating after divorce…etc. appear in her email, and in her social feeds, and most everywhere she goes online.

Mary never mentioned divorcing her husband when IMing her friend. She’d not even thought of it, really. In fact, she’s frequently sounded off about her marriage to friends through IM, as many women do. And it isn’t the first time Mary has gotten these dating and lawyer ads. It’s been going on a long time now, one ad after the other every time she even posts a back-handed joke about marriage in general. And after this last fight with her husband, well, like the ads keep saying, Mary deserves more! Like the ads say, she can find someone better than her husband. And like the ads say, a divorce will, “Open her life to the possible!”

These ads appear whenever Mary is expressing her frustration with her marriage. (Marketing is an iterative process.) And instead of looking to make it work with her husband, after a while all Mary wants to do is divorce and ‘open her life up to new possibilities.’

To Instagram, Mary’s divorce is a WIN! Their algorithms and the engineers who code them don’t care they’ve torn apart a family, for their profit. The software did its job and rewarded their advertisers. Some lawyer who advertises on their site just got themselves a client. Some dating app that spends millions annually in affiliate marketing on their platform just got a new subscriber. Multiply that with the hundreds of thousands of businesses doing affiliate marketing on the net, and you have, well, today’s internet.

NOT a SUPERCOMPUTER. And no longer, “The Information Highway.” But simply a marketing tool in which YOU are the PRODUCT of your online experience.

The Fatal Flaw with AI

by jcafesin, posted in business, careers, christianity, christians, marketing, recommendation, Silicon Valley, startups, technology

Saw #60Minutes last night with Google’s CEO #SundarPichai on the current state of #AI.

The opening bar, the interviewer, #ScottPelley, asked #SissieHsiao, Google’s VP, what Google’s new chatbot, #Bard, is for.

“It’s really here to help you brainstorm ideas to generate content like a speech or a blog post or an email,” she said with confidence, that made my skin crawl.

So, she’s suggesting that we shut off our brains, and rely on more software to construct our personal content. Let’s all stop exercising our neural connectivity to do tasks like writing an email, or posting a blog, like this one, that requires disciplines in linear thinking, quantitative and qualitative reasoning, real news research, and engagement of my MIND to construct. Ms Hsiao is suggesting that doing these tasks that demand, and PROMOTE brain power are worthless wastes of our time, and that Google’s AI can not only do better, but quicker.

So, Ms. Hsiao, where does that leave human brain power, assuming we aren’t all paid the big bucks by Google to fuck up humanity even more than you already do? A hint, honey: STUPID. Do that research Google, and even your software will find recent data that humanity is getting dumber:

…etc.*

Next, Scott Pelley was “speechless” that Bard made up a story from Hemingway’s six-word flash piece.** Mr. Pelley was so overwhelmed, he said, “Bard appears to possess the sum of human knowledge.”

BULLSHIT.

Bard does not know what it FEELS LIKE to be humiliated, admired, disrespected, loved. It does not know what it FEELS LIKE about anything. It does not know compassion, or empathy, regardless of what words it spits out because these things are ACTIONS! Words, like, “Our hearts and prayers are with the victims,” of the latest mass shooting, are meaningless, like so much of AI.

Beyond Bard having no knowledge of FEELINGS, it also does NOT have the “sum of human knowledge,” because Google scraps the internet, and every email exchange, and text conversation you have.

I gave away all my albums when CDs came out, thinking I’d replace them with disks, except I like obscure alternative music, and most of my record collection never made it to CDs. Just like MOST of human knowledge is NOT on the internet, and in our texts. Sorry Google, even YOU don’t have access to MOST OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE, so your #MachineLearning data sets are woefully inaccurate. Which brings me to the pic for this post…

In the picture attached about the New Testament, Scott Pelley asked Google’s chatbot, Bard, to “summarize the New Testament.” In 5 seconds, Bard came back with “The New Testament is the story of God’s love for humanity, which was revealed through Jesus Christ.”

BULLSHIT.

The actual Bible is filled with a jealous, angry, vengeful god (Corinthians 10:22; 2 Corinthians 11:2), who murders millions of people at his whim. Jesus is hateful to Jews (John 8:44) and others. He tells parables in which beatings, and even killings, of household slaves are affirmed as ‘disciplinary measures’ (Luke 12:45-47). Revelations, the last chapter in the New Testament, tells of God, and Jesus inflicting the “punishment of eternal destruction,” (2 Thessalonians 1:5-10) on anyone who doesn’t agree with, or believe in them. Strip away blind faith, this is called TOTALITARIANISM.

So why did Google’s Bard call the New Testament a “story of God’s love for humanity?” My human interpretation of the New Testament is, “The New Testament is a collection of violent stories that center around two jealous, angry narcissists who inflicted hardships, loss, plagues, and other forms of gruesome violence on humans.”

Google’s AI engine is trained on ALL THE DATA ON THE INTERNET, and your texts, and your emails, and everything you do on your phones, and ‘smart’ devices. This includes digital marketing—all those annoying ads—but also what people are saying, via texts, and posts, and blogs…etc., about any given subject. At least 80+%† of the U.S. identify as religious, or spiritual. Christianity alone touts 64% of the U.S. as believers, and, by far, puts out the most advertising. Christian marketing is close to a trillion-dollar a year industry.

Bard is a combination of Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, Deep Learning…etc, algorithms. That’s it. Garbage scraped from the internet and into the AI software, like Christian advertising, and people chatting up their spiritual beliefs, leaders, and groups, led Bard to spew Garbage Out—i.e. its positive, loving spin on the New Testament—even though the book itself, well… isn’t.

Since 99.999%…etc. of all that data Google’s collecting confirms both Bibles are good, righteous, and loving, Bard LEARNS that these books are, in FACT, what most everyone says they are. Google’s AI WEIGHTS the importance of data by consensus, NOT TRUTH, or even FACTS. Truth by majority consensus, like Germans who became Nazis, or religious believers convinced their religion is the only ‘truth.’ If only 30% of data collected on Christianity, for example, were positive, Bart would likely not have come up with the nonsense it did. If Scott Pelley hadn’t been religious himself, and questioned Bard’s translation of the New Testament, or the CEO of Google had pointed out that their AI is a WEIGHTING SYSTEM, where it places more ‘value’ on the masses than the FACTS, perhaps those of you who’ve read this far will get how dangerous these continuing developments in AI really are.

Another question from Scott Pelley: “Is Bard safe for society?”

Sundar Pichai: “I THINK so…”

—

**Human Idiocracy:

  • How many of you remember (or ever learned) phone numbers, now that you have them on speed dial. (Why does it matter? Try calling your kid in an emergency without your contacts list).
  • Who remembers, without the help of Google Maps, how to get to a place you’ve only been to once? Or even 20 times? For that matter, which of you even knows how to read a real map?
  • How many of you even know that the “news,” and information you’re getting through Google (or any) Search is only a fraction of what is on the internet, and worse, it is a reflection of how YOU think, delivered to you via recommendation engines that reinforce your own perspective? Essentially rec engines make you THINK you’re smart, but only make you dumber by serving up no other perspective than your own.

**Bard’s AI story, prompted from the words of Hemingway’s 6-word tale: “For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn,” missed the subtext of Hemmingway’s words entirely. No one buys baby shoes for a child yet to be born, which Google’s AI story suggests. Hemingway’s story, (and the original he stole it from), is about the loss of a baby already born. Infants get booties. Baby’s get shoes. So, it’s likely the baby was a year or more in age. Bard missed all of this completely, and made up a story virtually unrelated to Heminway’s 6-word tale.

† People who identify as nonreligious, but claim to be spiritual, are known as “NONES”.

How to Raise a Genius

by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

Went to the Jelly Belly Factory on a field trip with my daughter’s 2nd grade class. The young man assigned to escort us on the tour misquoted a brilliant saying by one of my favorite icons.

The guide delivered his canned speech, spoke of how long and complex the process to make even one single jelly bean, but that nothing great ever came easily, “as the inventor, Thomas Edison said: ‘Genius is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration.’”

But that is NOT what Tom said. He said, “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.”

So what is my issue with the mere 9% our tour guide misquoted?

Mr. Thomas Alva Edison was trying to tell us that to get good (‘genius’) at ANYTHING takes HARD WORK (‘perspiration’), and a lot of it. He should know. It took him, and an educated team of men many years and over 5,000 exploded glass bulbs to invent the light bulb.

Still, you say, it’s only 9%. The 8 year old’s the tour guide was talking to didn’t even know what “percent” meant. And while this may be true, there were 15 adults with the pack of 40 kids the guide was leading. And the parents understood. Most had probably never heard the quote before. It is somewhat obscure, which is a shame because it is an astounding insight. What the tour guide misquoted did not communicate the gravity of Mr. Edison’s meaning.

In the beginning of the 4th grade our son failed several math tests in a row, and upon inquire we found he didn’t understand the material. When asked why he hadn’t asked for help from either his teacher or us, he confessed he felt afraid he’d look dumb. Having always done fairly well in math, when he got lost, he felt too stupid to ask for help. He was supposed to be smart, but maybe he wasn’t, he cried, clearly shamed.

I hugged him, held him, and reminded him of old Tom’s saying for the hundredth time. Then my husband and I got to work, played tag team, alternating afternoons, evenings and weekends to teach our son what he needed to know. Within three months of daily math lessons he not only grasped the material presented but excelled to the top of Math Swap in his grade level and remained there through elementary school.

Our son now loves math. It’s his favorite subject. He works hard at it and that hard work just placed him in the most advanced math class at his new middle-school. Failing those math tests in the 4th grade turned into a great education for all of us. We got to see directly how hard work pays off. And though our son may not always tow the line of excellence, he now knows that ‘smart’ is not given, but earned.

The New York Times Magazine had an article a while back on ‘genius.’ It sited Anders Ericsson’s research on The Making of an Expert, which concluded ‘genius’ wasn’t born, as previously thought, but made.

“Outstanding performance is the product of years of deliberate practice, not any innate talent or skill,” according to K. Anders Ericsson, Michael J. Prietula, and Edward T. Cokely.

Most everyone starts out with the 1% inspiration. It comes with being human, and our ability to think abstractly.

Few of us have the tenacity, or the determination to endure failure after failure and continue through that last 5-10% it takes to achieve excellence. Most of us settle on gawking at greatness instead of pursuing it.

So, the question is not, ‘What is genius,’ or even excellence, but what motivates persistence?

Achieving good grades, or becoming a killer guitar player, or great at soccer, or even parenting, takes “deliberate practice.” We need to impart Tom’s wisdom to our children, teach them by example, with unwavering diligence, that reaching their potential can not be achieved blowing most of the day binge watching Netflix, or YouTube, or gaming. To actualize ‘greatness’ means devoting the 99% perspiration— the time, energy and effort necessary to create anything of lasting value. Whether it be a school report, a science project or a math test, genius is not only doable for most every child, but for all of us with hard work and persistence.

Reverse Racism IS Racism

by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

My daughter came home crying from her job as a barista for a local Boba Tea cafe.

“They don’t like me mom! I’m doing the exact same level of work that all the new kids are, and they keep calling ME out cuz I’m not Asian.”

Several other barista type jobs at various local businesses to which she applied told her flat out they only hire Asians (which, at least in my neighborhood, includes Indians, from India). Since most of the fast food and convenience stores here are owned by Asians, this has severely limited her choices for simple, flexible, part-time work.

A month ago, on the first day of this first job my daughter’s ever had, she came home and said, “My manager called me their ‘diversity hire,’ since I’m the only White person who works there. It hurt my feelings. He made me feel like I didn’t get the job cuz I deserved it.” Every day since, she’s come home with other racist comments most of her managers continue to make.

Our daughter has a 4.3 gpa, is a hard worker academically, and socially. She is the only White person in her small group of all Asian friends. She’s worked very hard, and continues to do so, to be a part of this bunch of kids, to fit into the Asian culture that is now well over 75% of her high school in our East Bay suburb of the San Francisco Bay area.

My son wasn’t so lucky. Boys going through puberty are all about bravado, one-upping each other. Girls are about connecting, communicating, building their community. Our son was excluded and bullied for not being “A”sian, throughout middle and high school. He had no friends at all, though he tried again and again to ‘fit in’ with them, from Karate to Robotics to Chess club and more. It broke his heart daily, and mine as well, watching my beautiful, open, kind kid ostracized for being White. He will likely struggle with a damaged self-image the rest of his life because of those formative experiences.

Yet, neither of my children are racists, like so many of their Asian friends and associates. My daughter gets bullied often, even from her ‘friends’ with thoughtless comments: “I only date Asians. I don’t find White girls attractive,” from the 4 out of 5 boys in her group. My daughter would love to get asked to proms, on dates. She watches her Asian girlfriends get asked out. She does not.*

These are REALITIES for all of us, Asians and Whites, here in the global melting pot of the San Francisco Bay Area, and yet my children are still not racists. Why, when so many are?

My daughter’s half White, half Chinese best friend had a sleepover the weekend before Thanksgiving. Her BF told me their family didn’t celebrate the holiday. Her mother was a tech-visa transplant from China in her early 20s, and had no association with U.S. traditions. She did not adopt them for her kids, regardless that they are native born here. My daughter’s BF confessed she’d always dreamed of celebrating Thanksgiving. Well, of course I invited her, and her mom and brother, right then. She was so excited she texted her mom the invite, and the girls were jumping up and down, cheering, moments later with her mother’s response.

The seven of us ate turkey, and stuffing, and shared stories of thanks around the table that night. We played Pictionary after dinner, and laughed and laughed. When the kids exited the scene to play video games, Yi, my husband and I spoke of relationships, politics, religion, ignoring social lines of polite conversation. And though we have radically different perspectives, and I felt no personal connection with few common interests, a profound one existed between us. She was raising two kids, a boy my son’s age, and a girl, my daughter’s best friend, Yi loves her children the exact same way, with the same intensity as I do mine.

Globalization is a REALITY. It’s happening, right now. Most first world nations are being inundated with immigrants looking for that illusive ‘better life.’ Like it, or not, global integration is here, and, as my husband, and our kids know, it is mandatory, simply must happen, for humanity, and our very small planet to survive.

My husband is a software architect. He’s been creating and deploying SaaS offerings for over 25 years here in Silicon Valley. Every job he’s ever had in the software industry, and trust me, he’s had a lot of jobs, he’s worked almost exclusively with Asians. While offshore H1B labor has been brought here by the tech industry since 1990, this massive Asian influx into the U.S. was not anticipated. In the last five yrs, the companies he’s worked for in software development, or any other department now, whether the staff is 30 or 3000—60% or more are of Asian descent. And yet, my husband is not racist, though he’s been passed up for many positions by Asians on work visas and H1Bs.**

“One wish,” my mom asked my sister and me on our drive home from elementary school back in the old days. “Anything you want, what would it be.”

“World peace,” I’d said. It was the mid-1970s, and a common catch phrase, but I meant it. Without war, or economic disparity, I believed in our creative potential to problem solve, and our unique ability to work together to realize our fantastical visions. I didn’t know about the hunger of greed then, insatiable, and colorblind.

It has been particularly hard on my kids, this globalization process. It deeply saddens me that they must suffer the slights of blind prejudice, just as the Asians in past generations had to suffer the racism of the ignorant Whites here. It terrifies me—the global competition for fewer jobs my kids will be competing for after college. Yet, I still advocate for globalization. This very small planet must integrate, or we will perish, and likely take much of the life here with us.

My daughter worries she’ll never meet anyone to date, yet alone marry, but I assure her she likely will. And it’s even likely that man will be Asian, since 60% of the global population are Asian*** and more than half of them are men. “It doesn’t matter where someone came from, what their heritage, or place of origin on the planet,” I’ve preached to my kids. “Choose to be with someone kind.”

A border wall surrounding the U.S. entirely will not stop Asians from flying in from China and India, Korea, Viet Nam, Indonesia and other emerging Asian nations. Nor will it stop the Middle East, South Americans, Cubans from coming here. Seeking to keep us separate is a fool’s play. Communication is key to build bridges over our differences, allowing us to meet in the middle and mutually benefit from our strengths. Ignorance and mistrust breed with distance. Nationalism is just thinly disguised racism.

Asians, Latinos, Syrian’s, and Palestinians, are all different cultures, not separate races from Caucasian. We are one race, the human race. Globalization—the blending of cultures—is hard for everyone, scary, new, threatening to our social structure, but a must if humanity is to survive, even thrive. The beauty of interracial marriage is the same thing that bonds Yi and I, as parents. We both passionately love our kids. She can’t possibly hate Whites, since her children are Asian/White. Combine two cultures, at least on a localize level, defeats racism, as most every parent loves their kids with the intensity Yi and I do. It’s one of our best bits about being human—the magnificent, spectacular, all-encompassing love we get to feel, and share as parents.

—

*Dating app data (in the U.S. and abroad) shows White men prefer Asian women, though it is unusual to see an Asian man partner with a White woman.

**Hiring offshore workers for less money, now being exploited by every social network from Facebook to Instagram to YouTube, to Mr. Trump’s summer staff at his Mar-a-Lago estate, lowers the pay rate for all of us. It’s no wonder U.S. income levels have been stagnant for years. There has been 308,613 H1B registrations for 2022, a 12.5% rise over 2021.

***Asia Population 2022 (Demographics, Maps, Graphs) (worldpopulationreview.com)