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Inevitable Surveillance?

What is the purpose of surveilling a domestic population? Is it inevitable?

Surveillance and spying are a little different but the benefits of each have long been understood. The purposes of spying are to know when an enemy is going to attack, their capabilities, the potential to attack them first, or what one might gain in making an attack, state to state or tribe to tribe. Learn plans, intentionally mislead, survive.

Domestic surveillance is different or at least thought of as being different. For some types of domestic surveillance the purpose seems to be that the population harbors enemies (overlapping with spying above), whether this means enemies of the state itself or those harmful to the rest of the population.

A version of that is that if there are people who have “wrong thinking,” then their “wrong thinking” can infect their neighbors, and eventually lead to violence or chaos. Continue reading “Inevitable Surveillance?”

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Problems or Puzzles

On important matters, people often put more effort into figuring out the right decision. But the right decision is different depending on who puts in the effort. And what if right is defined as the option that won the experimental split test rather than what seems to be best for the overall system?

Part of product testing (and even product concept testing) depends on generating demand data by running variations in front of customers. Run lots of variations, find the ones that perform better based on the metrics you value, and repeat.

I recently read a description of large-scale product experimentation for a financial services company. The business’ product experimentation had direct financial outcomes — namely improved customer retention and customer lifetime value. But there were costs too. Continue reading “Problems or Puzzles”

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Who Plays the Stradivarius in Interstellar Space?

This is a piece about the loss of skills — even ones that are marks of great beauty and mastery — due to a change in environment.

It’s an extreme example but a fun one to think through: who would play a Stradivarius violin in interstellar space?

As a way to think through an extreme environmental (not meaning climate here) change, I make the assumption that in coming centuries, whether one, five, or 10, humans will become an interstellar or extrasolar species. That is, some part of humanity will cease living in this solar system, and will instead live on other planets, space ships, or other artificial homes. I count that assumption as the less interesting part of this post and instead focus on the unintended consequences caused by a dramatic change in environment.

Let’s think through what happens to a specific type of human mastery (and by extension, a framework to apply to many others) as humans make extreme choices (like leaving earth).

Q: Who will play the Stradivarius in interstellar space or on extrasolar planets? A: No one. Longer answer below. Continue reading “Who Plays the Stradivarius in Interstellar Space?”

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Against the Natural Order of Things (Tech Change)

When it comes to changes, especially in technology, it’s common for people to have beliefs for what should and should not be. But where do these beliefs come from? How easy are they to change? What makes one person, or generation, or place, have a problem with something new, while another sees nothing wrong?

Where do these differences lead to second-order effects? How can we be aware of these effects and guard against them when we see new tech?

I believe that reflecting on these questions will help us figure out where there are opportunities to benefit. This is the start of exploration of this topic. Continue reading “Against the Natural Order of Things (Tech Change)”

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Under a Spell – The Armistice at 100

In under a week it will be the 100th anniversary of the armistice that ended hostilities during World War I. While WWI is distant enough in the past to no longer be a constant comparison to the present, those years of conflict still echo today. The war was a relatively short period when many things changed.

Thousands of others have already written at length about the first modern war and its consequences. These works fill entire libraries. Instead, here I look at what enduring technologies and strategies WWI gave opportunity to arise.

Continue reading “Under a Spell – The Armistice at 100”