Author: The Information Badger

Has our dependence on the online world gone too far?

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Business, Disaster recovery, Electricity, Information Technology, Online Services, resilience, Risk

Having worked in IT for decades delivering systems for a range of clients, the Badger’s suspicious that rigour in AI development is lower than that demanded by his clients. Perhaps the Badger’s suspicion is unfounded, but one has to wonder when there’s regular news about AI agents escaping their creator’s clutches to do things they shouldn’t. AI might be catapulting us towards a very different future, but there’s a huge question mark over whether a) AI companies can be trusted to manage the risks associated with the technology effectively, and b) be held accountable for mistakes. ‘Trust us’ seems to be the refrain from these companies. Trust, however, must be earned and social media companies blew that over the last decade or so for many people. Albert Einstein’s quip ‘Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters’ comes to mind. When high-risk industries from aviation to banking are, for the public good, subject to regulation, independent oversight, and meaningful penalties, then it cannot be acceptable that AI companies should be treated differently, especially when Anthropic warns of existential risks without safeguards.

More people today are wondering about the wisdom of depending on, and trusting, the online world in the light of the following. Meta’s $25 billion fine for misleading users on privacy. The State Attorney-General commented that ‘For too long, powerful technology companies have operated as though their size and influence put them above the law’, a sentiment shared by many. A PHP flaw has taken websites offline across the internet. The scramble to patch has disrupted organisations and users alike, and it’s highlighted once more our dependence on the internet and online services in daily life. Microsoft has pulled out of the project building the UK’s largest AI data centre due to power connection difficulties, a reminder that AI data centres are power-hungry, will only come on stream when their power demands are sustainably met, and do little for the planet. AI-related stocks have been highly volatile recently as investors increasingly question whether the huge investments being made are sustainable and will deliver profit. AI is now clearly impacting employment – see here, for example. Finally, the UK government wants everyone to improve their personal preparedness for emergencies and digital disruption is an item central to their messaging. Being able to function without access to online services is a no-brainer.

Has our dependence on the online world gone too far? Yes? Having lived without the internet, online services, and AI through the UK 3-day week energy crisis of the 1970s, the Badger knows that life can and will go on without them. Perhaps it’s time for younger generations to realise this, because, as sure as eggs are eggs, there will be serious, highly disruptive, AI and cyber-driven emergencies in the future which they will need to cope with…

Social media and the death of decency…

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Education, Information Technology, Leadership, Life, social media, Technology

It’s common for a group of friends to gather in a local pub to put the world right over a few beverages. Whenever such a group gets talking about global priorities, conflicts, politics, the economy, the climate, the press, social media, AI, or the routine ups and downs of modern life, discussion can become quite lively. While relaxing in his local pub with a relative recently, the Badger sat close to a group of seven people, obviously friends, discussing the above topics. Their discussion was free flowing with the exchange of varied views on many of these topics, especially those that get frequent airtime on broadcast news media. One of the quieter members of the group made an assertion that seemed to get unanimous agreement, namely that ‘Social media has caused the death of decency’. The Badger’s since been cogitating on this assertion because he saw the birth of social media during his IT career and its subsequent rise to the behemoth it is today.

There’s no doubt that since its birth, social media has driven a significant shift in how people interact with each other. Much of the shift – for example, being able to connect with, converse with, and share information with, individuals and communities across geographies was a big positive in its nascent years and remains so today. However, over the last two decades as the companies behind social media have grown into giant commercial enterprises, there’s been a progressive ‘darkening’ impact which has eroded decency in people’s everyday behaviour. It’s become common on social media for people to express opinions anonymously, to show disrespect and hostility towards strangers, and to post insensitive content about some thing or event without having to face immediate consequences. In real life, empathy, civility, and basic decency are important for societal stability, but social media has desensitised people to this reality.

When someone’s first instinct is to video a violent event and immediately share it on social media, then asserting that decency is dead seems fully justified. When the US President shares a tragic video of someone’s fatal interaction with a tiger at an animal park on his social media platform and follows this up with an inappropriate AI video of himself with a tiger, the fact that social media has changed societal norms is irrefutable. Given that empathy, ethics, and integrity are important traits for a good leader, surely the President should have known better.

Objectivity is important, but if you’ve lived with social media since its birth then the assertion that ‘social media has caused the death of decency’ is evidentially persuasive. Sadly, with the amount of spurious AI-generated content proliferating on social media today, the resurrection of decency looks very unlikely. Generation Alpha, the first generation to be raised from infancy with digital technology, deserve better than the social media facilitated decline in decency we see today…

Talk is cheap but results matter…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership, Management, Opinion

The Badger’s encountered many leaders of enterprises over the years, and most knew that ‘talk is cheap but results matter’. Most were acutely aware that no matter how eloquent they were in communicating their values, their organisation’s strategic objectives, and any changes or investments they wanted to implement, it was results that kept them in their job. According to here, the average tenure of a UK FTSE 100 CEO is a fraction over 6 years and that of a CFO is < 4 years. The average global CEO tenure is apparently ~7 years and falling because in a world dominated by advancing digital technology and economic turmoil, boards demand faster results. It isn’t, of course, just leaders of corporations who know that ’talk is cheap but results matter’. Anyone worth their salt who leads a team, a project, a business unit, or a department in any organisation knows this too because being able to delivery rapid results and milestones on time and to budget under pressure is crucial to being considered successful.

Some leaders can be outspoken and perceived as successful because they have the gift of the gab, even though their actions are dubious, their judgements flawed, and their delivery of results underwhelming. In the Badger’s experience, when the latter situation is exposed, it isn’t long before there are consequences. When you’ve encountered or observed such leadership dynamics over many years, then one’s instincts become highly tuned to detecting that a leader has lost the confidence of those in the project, business unit, or organisation they lead. Accordingly, the Badger’s instincts have been telling him for some time that the President of the USA is struggling because what he communicates is not matched by results.

The US mid-term elections are a few weeks away, and according to recent polls the President’s approval rating amongst the US public isn’t good. Why is that? There will be many opinions about the reasons for this, but the Badger thinks that, holistically, they can all be distilled down to the fact that rhetoric and pledges have not delivered the promised results. The proof has not been in the pudding! The President’s predicament thus appears to be a good example of ‘talk is cheap but results matter’ when it comes to leadership. In the President’s case, this perhaps seems a little surprising for someone with a long career in the business world.

The Badger’s not making a political statement here, he’s merely making an observation using a leader with a very high global profile to illustrate the theme of this piece. Being President is difficult, as is being a leader of a project, business unit, department, or any enterprise or organisation. If you want to succeed as a leader or manager, then your chances of succeeding are greater if ‘talk is cheap but results matter’ is built into your soul…

Redundant, obsolete, and trivial (ROT) information…

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Education, Information Technology, safety, Technology

An article, here, about the hidden cost of redundant, obsolete, and trivial (ROT) information in AI prompted the Badger to do some housekeeping of what’s stored on his personal computing devices. Accordingly, with a coffee in hand, the Badger began exploring some rarely used folders on a hard drive of one of his devices, one which doesn’t use ‘the cloud’. Unsurprisingly, this revealed an abundance of documents, scans, photographs, PowerPoint presentations, spreadsheets, notes, and other items with file dates that go back years. Opening some proved both entertaining and thought provoking. Some files triggered memories and reminders, but primarily the activity made the Badger realise that ROT information isn’t just a data management issue for organisations, it’s an issue for anyone with personal computing devices. There can be few of us who don’t have digital information that’s no longer useful, relevant, or necessary, because being a digital information hoarder has become normal!

As you will see here, digital storage has come a long way in the last 50 years. The Badger first used a personal computer in the mid-1980s when it had a 20MB hard-drive and a floppy disk! Since then, storage developments have been extraordinary. Today a mid-range smartphone has >100 gigabytes of storage, USB flash drives can hold hundreds of gigabytes, laptops and desktops with a terabyte or more are common-place, and, of course, there’s storage in the cloud. According to here, the world’s generating 4,661 terabytes of new data every second, most of it user-generated and unstructured, and growth worldwide is >20% per year. The amount of data created over the last 2 years alone accounts for >90% of data ever produced! Over the years we have perceived storage as cheap, but an inevitable truth is that storing more digital information always costs more than storing less, no matter how cheap it is. Given the growing data generation rate, we should all see ROT information as a growing problem especially in the realm of AI where information quality, currency, and relevance, rather than greater quantity, surely makes it smarter and more trustworthy.

The Badger suspects that a ‘storage is cheap’ mindset has reduced our personal disciplines regarding the management of the formation we produce. Many of us have become lazy digital information hoarders. Spurred on by this thought, the Badger ruthlessly cleansed his device. Today we live in a world where computing devices, digital storage, and information are abundant and at our fingertips. That, however, doesn’t mean we should ignore the fact that every item of information we store involves, in one way or another, the consumption of a number of the planet’s valuable resources. Recognising and addressing ROT information on our own devices thus plays a tiny part in reducing the demand on valuable resources. You don’t have ROT information, you might say. Look closer because it’s almost a certainty that you do…

An epidemic of apps…

Posted on by The Information Badger in apps, Automation, Change, Digital technology, Information Technology, Learning, Life, Technology

Organisations are increasingly insisting that you download an app because ‘it makes your life easier’. But should you really need an app on your phone to get a coffee in a garden centre’s café, to order food in an eatery, or to gain entrance to the changing rooms at a pool after a child’s swimming lesson? No. The Badger, perhaps, is just being grumpy about the epidemic of apps that is increasingly changing facets of everyday life.

The Badger’s young grandson attends a course of weekly swimming lessons. His parents have pre-paid for the course, and they and the Badger take it in turns to take him to the pool. All the kids and their accompanying adults congregate in the free poolside viewing area when they arrive. The kids, who all wear their swimming costumes under their normal clothes, disrobe. The instructor does a rollcall and then opens a glass gate to move the group of excited kids into the pool, and adults stay in the viewing area to watch proceedings. When the lesson finishes, the instructor sends the kids to the changing room the other side of the pool, and the adults go to the pool’s manned reception where the receptionist lets them through a turnstile to the changing area on mentioning the swimming lesson. This process has been long-standing. It works well, and it accommodates a reality, namely that there might be different accompanying adults each week. Three weeks ago, however, everything changed because a mandatory app that had to be used to operate the turnstiles to the changing room was introduced.

The Badger’s daughter-in-law, who had booked and paid for the course in the first place, downloaded the app and used it successfully to access the changing room after her son’s swimming lesson. The following week, the Badger’s son, who had also downloaded the app, was refused access at the turnstile because his phone wasn’t registered to the person who booked the course in the first place, i.e. his wife! Other accompanying adults experienced the same thing. After frosty exchanges with the receptionist, they were all let through. This week the Badger, who has consciously not downloaded the app, was his grandson’s accompanying adult. The receptionist simply sighed and let the Badger through the turnstile. One can but wonder how on earth this app has ‘made your life easier’.

An app collects all kinds of data about you and your behaviour that provides an organisation with advertising/notification opportunities, tighter control over their operations, and more profit. With the current epidemic of ‘apps for everything’ it’s worth remembering two things. Firstly, that every organisation pressing you to download an app has their interests at heart, not yours, and secondly that when you download an app you are trading some of your privacy and freedom for a convenience that doesn’t always really materialise…  

Digital advancement depends on physicists, material scientists, and engineers…

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Digital technology, Engineering, Information Technology, Science, Technology

Browsing the stalls of a large vintage and antiques fair recently, the Badger came across a battery-operated Sinclair Cambridge pocket calculator in working order. It took the Badger back to the 1970s when he, and many of his student friends, purchased one for £19.99, the equivalent of £290 today! Battery-powered pocket calculators had just become widely available, and they quickly became a ‘must have’ amongst students on science and engineering courses. Unsurprisingly, more powerful multi-function pocket calculators soon came along, and the Badger’s Sinclair Cambridge was replaced by a Texas Instruments TI-57 which provided years of service before being consigned to the back of a cupboard.

Since the fair, the Badger’s reflected on how digital technology has evolved since the pocket calculator of 50 years ago. The powerful, multi-purpose, smartphones we carry in our pockets today were pure science fiction in the 1970s. Since then, however, ‘digital’ has been one of the great achievements of the 20th and 21st centuries, ostensibly because it touches nearly all areas of human activity. Most people will, at some stage, have quietly wondered how its continued advances will impact their life in the future. After all, we can already see that drones have altered warfare, humanoid robotics has reached extraordinary levels (e.g. see here and here), automation dominates manufacturing and supply chains, electric vehicles are changing motoring, services are online-first, hybrid working is normal, social media is an asset and a liability, and that super-intelligent AI has as much capability for evil as it does for good. It’s thus natural and human to wonder about how the continued high rate of digital advancement affects our future.

Can, however, the high rate of digital advancement be sustained? Having retrieved his vintage TI-57 from the back of a cupboard, the Badger reflected on this question. The TI-57 has a semi-conducting silicon chip at its heart, and it’s the speedy development of integrated circuits and such microchips to provide more and faster computational capability that’s fuelled digital progress since the 1970s. Fundamentally, progress in the likes of physics, material science, and micro-engineering/manufacturing have determined the rate of digital technology’s advancement. It follows, therefore, that if progress in such subject areas slowed, then so will the rate at which digital advancement impacts our lives. Is slower progress in these subjects likely? Well, the Badger thinks it takes a brave person to write-off the possibility.

The future we hear about today, especially regarding AI, depends on more and faster computer chips at a time when the scientific boundaries of what’s achievable are being reached using the chip methods of recent decades. Just as it was when the pocket calculator first arrived, it’s scientists and engineers who will find necessary new solutions, and it’s their success in doing so that will really determine the rate of digital progress in the coming decades.

Digital ‘Never Forget’ moments – from 9/11 to AI…

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Digital technology, Ethics & Regulation, Information Technology, Innovation, Leadership, Life, Risk, safety, Tech for social good

It’s 25 years since 9/11, a truly ‘never forget’ moment. The Badger was workings at his desk in an office outside London when his son rang to ask if he was in London and safe. His son’s voice dripped with concern. The Badger provided the necessary reassurance and his son told him about the World Trade Towers, and that news channels were speculating that Canary Wharf and other London towers might also be targets. That phone call, let alone then watching the live pictures, has always been a ‘never forget’ moment for the Badger. It’s sobering to realise that ~40% of the world’s population today are <25 years old and relate to 9/11 mainly through images and information on social media, streaming platforms, and traditional television. Nevertheless, that day of atrocity will always be one of history’s ‘never forget’ moments.

The 9/11 anniversary caused the Badger to muse about digital technology’s ‘never forget’ moments in the last 25 years since that atrocity. Why? Because since then, digital technology has reshaped power structures, expectations, communication, global markets, and everyone’s behaviour. A few of the macro ‘never forget’ moments that emerged from this musing are as follows:  

  • The arrival of the iPhone in ~2007 because it embedded smartphones as disruptive consumer devices that have changed communication, business, photography, navigation, and entertainment forever.
  • The 2008/9 financial crash, because the exposed vulnerabilities in traditional banking systems spawned innovative fintech digital tools which have since improved, automated, and expanded financial services for individuals and businesses.
  • The 2018 Cambridge Analytica scandal, because it raised awareness of how much social media platforms impact culture, politics, marketing, global behaviour, wellbeing, and the privacy of individuals.
  • The 2020 global COVID pandemic, because digital technology became essential for remote working, video conferencing, and the design, development and production of the mRNA vaccines which saved millions of lives then and continue to do so now.
  • The 2022 release of ChatGPT, because it marked AI becoming mainstream for the public. It reached 100 million users within 2 months, triggered an AI investment boom, and profoundly changed forever how governments, businesses, and individuals think about technology, work, and machine intelligence.

Other moments emerged, as did one overarching truth – digital technology has reshaped the very fabric of society since 9/11.

Another ‘never forget’ digital moment happened in recent days. The US President belittled the worries of major US AI company leaders that advances are happening so fast that there’s a tangible threat to human safety, and that perhaps development should slow to put safeguards  in place. The President’s ‘No, it’s a hoax’’ response wasn’t that of a wise statesman, it was the response of someone with money, power, ego, and winning at any cost at the centre of everything. Should the worst happen with AI, people will ‘never forget’ that human safety was not on the President’s priority list…  

Who really gets a problem project back on the rails?

Posted on by The Information Badger in Business, Delivery, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership, Learning, Technology

There’s rarely a single cause for why a software or systems project goes off the rails. Normally, project problems are a consequence of human, organisational, and process-related issues caused by things like poorly defined requirements, scope creep, poor planning and tracking, poor line management oversight, poor communication, and difficult client relationships. Sometimes projects really hit the buffers and matters end up in the law courts. More often than not, however, client and supplier executives recognise that failure is, for one reason or another, not an option and so they agree to do what it takes to get the project back on the rails and get the system delivered. One of the Badger’s formative experiences was being part of a small team tasked with getting one of his employer’s major fixed-price projects back on the rails. The project was a basket case exhibiting all the causal characteristics noted above, but the system to be delivered was strategically and politically important to the client and supplier alike. Turning it around was hard work but a great learning experience.

One of the Badger’s colleagues on the fix-it team, Jock (not their real name), was an experienced Scotsman with a sense of humour. Their task was to re-establish a comprehensive, contractually compliant, Functional Specification for the system that was fully agreed with the client. This meant Jock and others, including sometimes the Badger, met with the client’s team of operational users and contractual minders for daily functional discussions over many weeks. It was soon evident that Jock was objective, entirely focused on his task, and masterful in corralling those with different opinions and functional perspectives to a common agreement. Eventually a new Functional Specification, the lynchpin to getting the project back on the rails, was formally agreed. Jock had been firm, fair, and engaging throughout. Although he’d built a good relationship with the client team and great respect within the project team, he didn’t consider himself a natural leader or negotiator.

What did the Badger learn from working with Jock? Firstly, to recognise the difference between a negotiable issue and a non-negotiable principle. Secondly, to say ‘No’ and mean it when it’s appropriate and necessary. Thirdly, that saying, ‘Yes, but that’s not part of the contracted baseline’ unemotionally and assertively is an effective way of saying ‘No, you can’t have it unless we agree the impact and price’. The Badger learned something else too, namely that Jock was a natural leader, and that leaders don’t have to be extroverts, aggressive, intolerant, petulant, or have a distant demeanour. Jock demonstrated that natural leaders are relatable, build respect, have a backbone and principles, don’t clamour to be in the spotlight, and remain objective and fair under pressure. When a project goes off the rails, we should remember that it’s people like Jock rather than company executives who really get it back on the rails.

Your face, voice, and personality – think before you post…

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Digital technology, Education, influencers, Information Technology, Life, Online Safety, Online Services, Privacy and Surveillance, Risk

In our digital world an individual’s identity has become more vulnerable as well as highly valuable. Ever since the Cambridge Analytica scandal, many people have limited posting audio, video, and photographs of themselves online in case they are misused by others because, as a friend put it recently, ‘regardless of what we’re told, you can’t be entirely sure who or what will use your posts for their own purpose’. On the other hand, of course, putting podcasts, images, and videos of themselves online is part of their daily life for many people. If you work as an actor, a television presenter, an online influencer, or you are a leader in politics, government, or business, then your face, voice, and image are especially vulnerable to being used to create fake content for nefarious purposes (e.g. see here). Accordingly, there’s no surprise in reading recently that ~80 performers have written to the UK government demanding greater protection against their voices being used by AI. It isn’t, however, just performers that need this greater protection, it’s actually everyone.

Regardless of who you are, something posted online which includes your voice, face, and body image can be manipulated and monetised without you knowing or giving your permission. AI makes it straightforward to create realistic, fake, digital clones of you from audio clips, videos, and images posted online. Your identity could thus be misused, taken away from your control, and your digital clone could be used in scams and other criminality. Surely, therefore, your legal ownership of your voice, face, and body image is embodied as a single right in UK law? Well, no this isn’t the case. Instead, UK law provides a mix of protections for the individual under privacy, intellectual property rights, and a number of other laws. There’s no dedicated legal framework for individuals to control the use of their voice, face, or body image, which makes it challenging and hugely expensive to protect against unauthorised exploitation.

This feels to the Badger like another illustration that the law always hugely lags rapidly advancing digital technology enabling companies to play fast and loose for their own commercial gain. Denmark is apparently one of the first countries in the world to create copyright-style protection for individuals over their face, voice, and other personal distinguishing features. Will the UK introduce something similar? There’s no sign of that, which means it’s worth remembering that it’s been sensible in the digital world for years to think very carefully before posting images, audio, and video of yourself online. ‘Think before you post’ is even more sensible in the era of AI. After all, your face, voice, and personal characteristics are unique to you through birth and biology. They are at the heart of your identity as a human and it can never be right that anyone or anything can use your identity without your explicit permission.

The digital world – a public nuisance?

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Business, Digital technology, Information Technology, Life, Risk, Science, Technology, Transformation, Wellbeing

The old coin/card ticket machines in the local High Street’s car park have been replaced by swanky touch-screen units that only take contactless payment. To be fair, there’s one new machine in the car park that still purports to take coins and contactless payment, although nobody has so far been able to get it to actually accept coins! There’s something else too. It’s an open-air car park and the screens on the new units are hardly readable on a bright sunny day. The new machines are straightforward to use once you know how, but earlier this week the only functioning machine was the one purporting to take coins as well as contactless payments. There was a queue, which the Badger joined, but the pensioner at the head of the queue was having trouble getting the machine to accept their contactless card payment. Giving up, they tried coins instead, and that didn’t work either. The flummoxed pensioner thought there was something wrong with their bank card. A kind lady stepped in and said she’d pay for the pensioner’s ticket using her own card. That didn’t work either, causing the lady and the pensioner to grumble ‘The digital world is a public nuisance’.

The Badger subsequently cogitated on whether the digital world is indeed a public nuisance. Putting the legalities of what constitutes a public nuisance to one side, whether the digital world’s a nuisance depends on your perspective. Grandparents, parents, young adults, and children have different perspectives, but research across this age spectrum apparently suggests that views are not purely yes or purely no, but definitely not neutral. Many think the digital world enhances social interactions, learning opportunities, business efficiency, innovation, convenience, and so on. However, many believe it’s become a nuisance because a) it’s dominated by self-interested major corporations who put their profits rather than users first, and b) it lessens person to person physical contact, encourages excessive screen time, distorts our sense of reality, erodes personal privacy, is an enormous source of mis and disinformation, and causes mental, health, and behavioural issues in young adults, children, and vulnerable groups.

Does the Badger think the digital world’s a public nuisance? No…but beginning to lean towards yes! No, because a lengthy career in the IT industry showed that in the right hands, with good laws, controls, and ethical and moral human behaviour within acceptable societal norms, the digital world produces enormous benefits and is a good servant to mankind. Why leaning towards yes? Because although the science relating to the digital world’s impact on humanity has been too slow over the last few decades, it’s now confirming that nuisances are real and often harmful. It’s thus reasonable to conclude that mankind is fast becoming a servant to the digital world when it should be the other way round, and that AI is destined to reinforce this in the coming years…