Deepfakes and Our Belief Systems April 2, 2021
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Technology and Culture.Tags: deepfakes
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What we believe has become very controversial in recent years. There is the old saw that we can choose what we believe, but we can’t choose our facts. Or can we?
Deepfakes are images or videos can today be manipulated to show false narratives. Probably the most famous is how social media outlets posted a video of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, simply slowing it down to the point where she was slurring her words and appeared to be drunk.
But videos can also be entirely synthesized, through a combination of existing digital content, manipulating how that content is displayed, editing that content, and adding new content. While I’m not the artist enough to do it, the tools are within reach for plenty of people.
Certainly in politics, international diplomacy, and maybe even in business, deepfakes have the clear potential to change the narratives of debates. And they will, as people will continue to believe what they see, because how can our eyes lie? (Cue The Eagles Lyin’ Eyes).
But deepfakes can also be used for more prosaic purposes, such as product placement. Or, as the above example suggests, trashing people we want to trash, for our own personal purposes.
You and (I’m not sure) I can come up with deepfakes. And we will. I would like to think that I have a little more ethics than this, but it’s still problematic. So where, precisely, are we going with deepfakes? I don’t think it’s a good place.
The Loss of Local Journalism March 22, 2021
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Technology and Culture.Tags: Carl Hiaasen, Virtual communities
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Carl Hiaasen is retiring as a longtime journalist for the Miami Herald, and it sounds like he’s leaving Florida altogether. I don’t live in Florida; I know Hiaasen as a funny fiction writer (Basket Case is my clear favorite).
This normally wouldn’t be of particular interest to me, except for remarks Hiaasen made concerning local journalism in his last column.
“Retail corruption is now a breeze, since newspapers and other media can no longer afford enough reporters to cover all the key government meetings. You wake up one day, and they’re bulldozing 20 acres of pines at the end of your block to put up a Costco. Your kids ask what’s going on, and you can’t tell them because you don’t have a clue.
“That’s what happens when hometown journalism fades — neighborhood stories don’t get reported until it’s too late, after the deal’s gone down. Most local papers are gasping for life, and if they die it will be their readers who lose the most.”
For much of my adult life, growing up with rapidly changing technology, I believed that people would gradually stop associating with where they lived, and who they lived next to. Instead, we would become virtual, forming worldwide communities based on our interests rather than our physical location. I thought this was inevitable, and entirely a good thing.
Well, it is happening that way, but too many of the results aren’t pretty. On the positive side, I count as friends many technology professionals worldwide, and stay in touch via email or LinkedIn, with the occasional conference. My life has been enriched by these experiences.
But it has also enabled virtual groups devoted to hate, or devoted to absurd conspiracies. And the power of those groups is amplified by their virtual reach. In short, at least some of them have become a significant danger to modern civilization.
So I think Hiaasen is right, in that we have given local news, and local journalism the short shift. I don’t know if there is any way of bringing back the geographically local element of our lives, but it is worthwhile trying to do so. When I go out walking in the neighborhood (masked these days, of course), I at least greet my neighbors, and occasionally engage them in conversation.
I also have an alderman (Alderwoman? Alderperson?) who years ago gathered together as many email addresses as she could in order to keep her ward informed on local happenings. She has since retired, but still sends out large group emails on zoning, community meetings, and the like.
So give it a try. Talk to your neighbors. Try to engage people in community activities. Maybe even find ways to support your local newspaper. Our lives will be better in return.
Facebook and the Cult of Secrecy June 5, 2018
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Technology and Culture.Tags: Facebook, Snowden
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I recall the worldwide controversy in 2013 surrounding National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, who published secret (and above) information about the NSA listening programs to the world at large. These revelations prompted some worldwide protests against the data collection by the NSA (and by extension GCHQ in the UK and others).
I gave the entire Snowden mess a shrug of my shoulders. I am not a big fan of secrets, personal or institutional. I do think that there are things in life that we justifiably attempt to keep secret, for a variety of reasons. However, I also believe that any attempt to keep something a secret for any significant period of time is ultimately futile. “Three people can keep a secret, if two are dead” represents my belief in the longevity of secrets.
However, I can’t help but marvel at people protesting against government data collection, yet those same people, and many more, willingly giving far more personal data to Facebook. I simply don’t get why Facebook, which is undeniably more effective than the NSA, gets a pass on their deeper intrusions in our lives.
Facebook should have taught us that there are no secrets. I don’t think that we’ve learned that lesson, and I certainly don’t think Facebook has. This article notes the company’s duplicitous behavior regarding what it says and what it actually does. In this case, it was Zuckerberg himself who told Congress that they no longer shared user and friend information with third parties.
It turns out that Facebook deliberately decided not to classify 60 (yes, 60) phone manufacturers as third parties. Zuckerberg’s excuse: they needed to provide them with real user data in order to test the integration with the app on their devices. Un, no.
Now, I am a tester by temperament, and know darn well that the normal practice is to munge data used for testing. Facebook providing 60 vendors with real data is not testing, it is yet another violation of their terms of service. Oh, but Facebook is allowed to do that as long as someone (the janitor, perhaps) apologizes and says it won’t happen again.
So here you have it – Facebook lies, and will continue lying as long as they can get away with it. And who lets them get away with it? You do.
Update: Facebook bug set 14 million users’ sharing settings to public. I really don’t at all understand why people put up with this.
Lena, Fabio, and the Mess of Computer Science April 11, 2018
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Software development, Technology and Culture.Tags: Brotopia, computer science, Fabio, graphics processing, Lena
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The book Brotopia opens with a description of Lena, the November 1972 Playboy centerfold whose photo by chance was used in early research into image processing algorithms at USC. Over time, that singular cropped image became a technical standard to measure the output of graphics algorithms. Even today it is used in academic research to point out details of the value of alternative algorithms.
But today this image is also controversial. Some complain that it serves to objectify women in computer science. Others say it is simply a technical standard in the field. A woman mathematics professor applied similar graphics algorithms to Fabio in an attempt to bring some balance to the discussion.
In the 8th grade (around the time of Lena), my middle school (Hopewell Junior High School) partitioned off boys to Shop class, and girls to Home Ec. Perhaps one boy a year asked for Home Ec class, but it could only be taken by boys as a free elective, and was viewed as an oddity. During my time there, to my knowledge no girl asked to be in Shop class.
Of course, I thought nothing of it at the time, but today such a segregation is troubling. And even in 2015, a high school computer science class used Lena to show off their work with graphics algorithms, to mixed reviews.
There are many serious problems with the cult of the young white male in tech today. As we continue to engage this demographic with not-so-subtle inducements to their libidos, we also enable them to see themselves as the Masters of the (Tech) Universe. That worked out so well for the financial trading firms in the market failures of the 1980s and 2000s, didn’t it?
Does the same dynamic also make it more difficult for women to be taken seriously in tech? I think that it is part of the problem, but by no means the only part. Women in tech are like people in any field – they want to do their jobs, and not have to have cultural and frat boy behaviors that make it that much more difficult to do so.
I’ve been fortunate to know many smart and capable women throughout my life. I had a girlfriend in college who was simply brilliant in mathematics and chemistry (in contrast, I was not brilliant at anything at that point in my life). She may have been one of the inspirations that led me to continue plugging away at mathematics until I managed a limited amount of success at it. Others try to do their best under circumstances that they shouldn’t have to put up with.
So let’s give everyone the same chance, without blatant and subtle behaviors that demean them and make them feel less than what they are. We don’t today. Case in point, Uber, which under Travis Kalanick was the best-known but by no means the only offender. I hope we can improve, but despair that we can’t.
Has Moneyball Killed Baseball? June 20, 2017
Posted by Peter Varhol in Education, Publishing, Strategy.Tags: analytics, baseball, Machine Learning, Moneyball, software
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Moneyball was a revelation to me. It taught me that the experts could not effectively evaluate talent, and opened my own mind to the biases found in software development, testing, and team building. Some of my best conference presentations and articles have been in this area.
But while Moneyball helped the Oakland Athletics, and eventually some other teams, it seems to be well on its way to killing the sport. I’ve never been a big sports fan, but there were few other activities that could command the attention of a 12-year old in the late 1960s.
I grew up in the Pittsburgh area, and while I was too young to see the dramatic Bill Mazeroski home run in the 1960 World Series, I did see the heroics of Roberto Clemente and Willie Stargell in the 1971 World Series (my sister was administrative assistant at the church in Wilmington NC where Stargell had his funeral). I lived in Baltimore where the Pirates won a Game 7 in dramatic fashion in 1979 (Steve Blass at the helm for his third game of the series, with Dave Guisti in relief).
But baseball has changed, and not in a good way. Today, Moneyball has produced teams that focus on dramatic encounters like strikeouts, walks, and home runs. I doubt this was what Billy Beane wanted to happen. That makes baseball boring. It is currently lacking in any of the strategy that it was best at.
As we move toward a world where we are increasingly using analytics to evaluate data and make decisions, we may be leaving the interesting parts of our problem domain behind. I would like to think that machine learning and analytics are generally good for us, but perhaps they provide a crutch that ultimately makes our world less than it could be. I hope we find a way to have the best of both.
Really, CNN.com? March 31, 2017
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Technology and Culture.Tags: cnn
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I recognize that the mainstream media, or MSM, has been under fire lately. And has been under financial and relevancy pressure for at least two decades, as falling ad rates for digital media has cut still further into its advertiser-driven business model. That one is a difficult one to solve, but that doesn’t absolve CNN from actually trying to solve it.
But giving advertising content the same placement and appearance as your news content is simply so far over the top that I am beside myself. Here is a screen capture of CNN Money that shows “sponsored content” (advertising) presented in the same manner as news.
This is wrong on so many levels I can’t even count them. That CNN.com would lower itself to this is unconscionable. There are plenty of people who still respect and appreciate actual news, and they are (or can be if you care) your biggest defenders.
And really, CNN.com. It is purported news stories like this one on the move of the Oakland Raiders that make even reasonable people doubt your veracity. I have never read such a one-sided, biased, and inflammatory article on a major news site. You never even bothered to seek out and question Raiders owner Mark Davis, or to say that the Raiders and A’s are the last teams to be playing in the same stadium, by a long shot, or that Davis is relatively cash-poor and would likely have to give up ownership in order to remain in Oakland. I live nowhere near Oakland, and have no dog in this hunt, but this does not even begin to pass the smell test. Sometimes you are just too stupid for your own good.
Journalism is more interesting when it has a point of view. You may not always (or ever) agree with that point of view, but it is important to absorb and consider it. But this is presented as objective news, yet is neither.
CNN, I know that it’s not easy, but it’s time to grow up and figure out your path without continuing to resort to cheap tricks like these.
Who Is the Data For? March 1, 2017
Posted by Peter Varhol in Publishing, Technology and Culture.Tags: big data, data
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Andreas Weigend recently published an intriguing book called Data For the People, in which he argues that we are not going to stop the proliferation of personal data that is used to categorize and market to us, so we should embrace this change and find ways to use collected data to our advantage.
He cites many of the data points that I do in my blog posts, but comes to different conclusions. In particular, my own thoughts are to limit my use of personal data on a case-by-case basis. His own conclusion is that we need to accept the proliferation of personal data as inevitable, and embrace it in a way that makes it valuable to us.
He makes a lot of sense, from an alternative point of view from mine, and I won’t dismiss it out of hand.
However, I would like to contrast that with another article, one that points out that when we choose our friends through shared data, we lose our ability to connect with our physical neighbors.
So, here is what I think. I think Andreas is correct, strategically. But I am simply not sure how we get from where we are to where he wants to be. I don’t think it will be clean and neat. And it certainly won’t be convenient, especially for those of us who are at least part way through our lives.
I’ve used this quote before, but it remains apropos. From Crosby, Stills, and Nash: “If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with.”
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