Category Archives: Information

BOOK: “Reinventing the Bazaar” by John McMillan

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Reinventing the Bazaar: A Natural History of MarketsReinventing the Bazaar: A Natural History of Markets by John McMillan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher Site – Norton

This is a highly readable overview of markets: how they work, how they fail, what they’re good for, and what they aren’t. It’s an objective accounting of markets that neither cheerleads nor condemns but rather seeks to get at how markets form a system that is at once both the best of worlds and the worst.

The key to this book’s success is the selection of case studies, many of which are fascinating. While the subtitle, “A Natural History of Markets,” might lead the reader to think that this is a much bigger and more boring book than it is, McMillan actually picks a case or two to illustrate each of the seventeen topical chapters. Topics include: the peculiarities of markets for information, approaches to auctions, issues around intellectual property, inequality, governance and policy interaction with markets, etc.

It’s not easy to enjoy reading a book about economics, but this one certainly draws the reader into its web. I’d highly recommend this as a go-to guide for anyone who wants a compelling and objective introduction to markets.

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PROMPT: 20 Years

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Daily writing prompt
What’s a piece of technology you’re convinced will exist in 20 years?
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I think cell phones will be replaced by cheap cyborg implants that fulfill the same myriad functions and more. Just as we were convinced that we were being given a great benefit with social media, when — in fact — we were just handing over our attention and data on the cheap. This time we’ll be signing away a great deal more — we’ll be meat puppets for the billionaires, carrying out consumption function programming as ignorantly blissful as Cypher from The Matrix. Welcome to the Cyber-Sheep economy. BAHaaaaah.

Proviso: People (me included) are shite at forecasting. We call broken clocks “genius” based on those two times a day they are right, but forecasting genius is just selection bias plus Mrs. Cleo pseudo-psychic tactics (be vague, sound specific.) Also, remember we are always one nuclear winter away from flint knapping being the prevailing mode of technology.

BOOK: “The AI-Driven Leader” by Geoff Woods

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The AI-Driven Leader: Harnessing AI to Make Faster, Smarter DecisionsThe AI-Driven Leader: Harnessing AI to Make Faster, Smarter Decisions by Geoff Woods
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Publisher site – Simon & Schuster

As the title suggests, this is a book about how leaders can use artificial intelligence (AI) to better perform their jobs, jobs which include many aspects – not the least of which is to facilitate greater adoption of AI by their company or organization. The author’s central premise is that AI offers tremendous potential but is often underutilized because leaders have too many near term items on their plate to muck about with it. This creates a paradox in which most leaders see the benefits and would like to see greater AI adoption, but few take the time to advance that goal.

Not being a leader, I got the most out of the book’s discussion of what kinds of prompts can be used to meet various objectives in order to move AI beyond just a personable search engine that (to some degree) shows its work. However, it is intriguing to see how AI may shape various organizations as leadership changes its approach to it.

The author uses a great deal of strategic repetition to pound a few key ideas into the reader’s mind. I found this to be beneficial, but I can imagine some may find the repetition tedious.

Like it or lump it, there’s no getting around the impact of AI on our world. This is a worthwhile read to gain some insight into how that impact may play out.

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PROMPT: Social Media

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Daily writing prompt
How do you use social media?
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I don’t use social media. It uses me, or — more precisely — it uses my information and attempts to use my attention — as it does of us all. Perhaps it was a symbiote but it’s becoming ever more parasitic.

PROMPT: A Break

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Daily writing prompt
Do you need a break? From what?
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Yes. The manipulation. Attention merchants selling space in our heads to AI-powered rage bait creators for a magical misdirect on a scale never before seen. While people are pointing fingers of outrage, the last thin dime is being pried out of their pockets to fuel wildly depraved existences, and the robbed are left to wonder how the people they were pointing at — who they had their eyes on the entire time — managed to pull off a pickpocket.

#bamboozledbybillionaires

PROMPT: Clutter

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Daily writing prompt
Where can you reduce clutter in your life?
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My brain.

Information Boneyard [Free Verse]

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The Information Age 
   bloomed & died
   from wave after wave 
   of information inflation 
   and counterfeit information -
      cheap knockoffs flooded
      the market!

 We live in a
   post-information world:
   an information junkyard,
   to be precise.

 Rusting, useless detritus 
   poses as treasure.
 We catch glints
   and think it value,
 But even turds can glitter 
   in the Sun.

PROMPT: Screentime

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How do you manage screen time for yourself?

Many ways, really: e.g. Go for a walk or otherwise move. Forget it exists. When the WiFi goes down, take it as a sign from the universe. Juggle. Do something productive.

PROMPT: Crazy Business

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Daily writing prompt
Come up with a crazy business idea.
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Well, as we all know that voice-activated “digital assistants” (e.g. Siri and Alexa,) have both become insanely popular that they and spy on you around the clock, gathering information to sell to “big data” marketing firms, I propose a service that would involve coming to your house and making noises and statements that would turn the collected “information” into disinformation. The best part is, the package could be tailored to your desires and preferences. If you’re a milquetoast person but don’t like that reputation, you could get the Orgy Pack which would make your house sound like a non-stop bacchanal. If you’re really a mobster, there could be the sounds of meetings to set up a church bingo night. The possibilities are endless.

Remember, until the Robot Uprising, don’t let yourself be punked by the machines. Subscribe to DISINFORMATION DAILY today.

BOOK REVIEW: The Abolition of Man: Deluxe Edition Carson Grubaugh, et. al.

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The Abolition of Man: The Deluxe EditionThe Abolition of Man: The Deluxe Edition by Carson Grubaugh
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon.in Page

Release Date [for Deluxe Ed.]: July 25, 2023

This is marketed as the first comic book illustrated by an AI. That makes it a very different beast from the usual graphic novel or comic book, and it means the purpose for reading it is entirely different. If I were to rate this for someone who wanted to read an entertaining story (the usual purpose of a graphic novel,) I would rate it “horrible,” “worst-ever,” “unreadable,” – zero stars. However, if you bothered to read the book blurb, you probably aren’t still considering this book for the purposes of entertaining story.

What other reasons might one have for reading this book? I can think of two: one major and one minor. The major purpose is to see what an AI does with illustrations, how it “thinks” (for lack of a better word,) and how it fails. For this purpose, I’d say the book was fascinating to peruse. As a complete neophyte to both AI and graphic arts, I was struck by the “glimpse-comprehensible / close look-grotesque” nature of the illustrations. That is, if one just took a quick look, there tended to be something that felt like it made sense in the panel, but then when you looked closer it was a cabinet of curiosities freak show.

The minor reason for reading this is because one has an interest in the philosophy of mankind in the modern world, a topic that informs the first and last issues (or the philosophy of information, which informs the appendiceal essays.) In this regard the book made some thought-provoking points.

The base text the AI was fed to come up with illustrations varied across the five issues. The first was the eponymous C.S. Lewis book — i.e. “The Abolition of Man.” While this didn’t present the Lewis text word-for-word, it was certainly the most readable portion of the book. The second and third comics drew on text from a comic written by Grubaugh. I assume the AI processed this text somehow because the text presented was often incomprehensible, was full of typos (or what seemed like them,) but had a couple amusing lines by virtue of what I can only assume was unintended sexual innuendo. The fourth issue is almost textless, but what few text bubbles exist were supposedly composed by AI (they don’t have much information value.) [FYI- this penultimate issue is the stuff of nightmares. In places, it looks like a guide to fatal birth defects.] The final issue is a philosophy essay on the role of human dignity in privacy expectations. It’s an interesting enough read, but the graphics are like a PowerPoint by someone who took, but failed, a course on PowerPoint graphic design.

If you’re curious about how close AI is to drawing graphic novels and have an interest in philosophy of humanity and / or information, you’ll find this book to be a worthwhile read. If you’re expecting an interesting story, you’ll be sadly disappointed. If you’re a budding Andy Warhol, looking for a way to make the next artistic breakthrough requiring little effort or creativity on your own part, you might see the next big thing.


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