Items I happen to view each day. Science, Technology, Management, Culture, and Writing

    This is my day book for this week. It is a log of things I see on the Internet.

This week: 20-26 January, 2025

Summary of this week:

• The Russians are still in Ukraine
• There is a cease fire in the Israel-Gaza conflict as Mr. Trump becomes President
• Donald Trump becomes President of the United States again
• TikTok goes offline, for one day
• Mr. Trump makes many moves his first week in office
• People in real America care about TikTok, not jobs in the Dept of Justice

Monday 20 January 2025

A Stanford research report on AI in the Federal government is not flattering to the Chief AI Officers in agencies. They just don't know much about AI. They are career bureaucrats.

Despite all the news about a trade war etc., the US and China have cooperated for years on AI research.

TikTok is back online this morning. Stay tuned for what happens next in this saga of the place where teenage girls post after-school dance videos.

Bluesky announces that they too will facilitate teenage girls after-school dance videos and the like.

We need a national effort to save local journalism (say some). Is that a contradiction?

And government experts (is that a contradiction in terms) say that Baltic sea data and power cables were damaged by accident.

Amazon employees returned to the office. Not enough parking spaces and not enough chairs or desks.

Linux 6.13 is released.

Adding little stories to non-fiction writing. Of course it works.

Good piece on why many freelance writers aren't paid much money.

When the light enlightens.

Daily writing vs binge writing. Writing is writing. Writing on the current big project is different. Understand the difference.

I like this piece about having an central idea for a book and sticking with that one idea too long. Sometimes the idea is good for a starter, but there comes a time to abandon it and write a different book.

Bored as a writer? Do something different. Why do we have to remind ourselves of such obvious things?

Let's revisit social media once again for 2025 and writers. Which sites? How much time?

Thoughts on the concept of "suspense" in fiction.

A call for writers to continue writing (what else would a writer do?). And this also boosts the self-importance of the writer to heights that are a bit too much.

Too old for this? Nope, just getting started.

Tuesday 21 January 2025

In an odd period of history, this one ... well ... Mr. Biden issues pardons for many people who have never been charged with crimes.

The professional football team associated with the Ohio State University wins the national championship, minor league division, in football. Lots of money is flowing, so I suppose that is good for someone.

Much is being made about the billionaire$ front and center at the Trump inauguration. It is widely and well known that Mr. Trump highly respects two groups of people: (1) military generals and (2) those who have made it rich in business. Both groups generally show high competency and that seems to bother some folks.

Mr. Trump renames the US Digital Service (an Obama creation) to the US DOGE Service. The government website has not changed (usual slowness). And government unions, which don't really exist, are already suing the President.

One of the first-day Trump Executive Orders revokes a Biden EO on AI. Less regulation, more experiments, and let adults decide what will work better.

Everyone take care if you stick out your arm high to wave to someone. You could be a Nazi saluting Hitler or something like that.

Another first-day EO bans Federal employees from telling social media outlets what they should censor. That practice was mind numbing from the start. How did anyone think it was okay. "But they are not correct in what they say!" That is the hallmark of the American legacy media. Look at old magazines and see how being incorrect occurred all the time.

What's a day without TikTok ban news? Yet another EO delays a law (can you do that?) and protects someone from something.

Nvidia is limited to what AI processors it can sell in China. Chinese companies are jumping into this lower-powered competition.

Comparing Nvidia's 5090 to the 4090. More better at lower prices.

This editorial predicts doom and gloom as the billionaire tech celebrity CEOs will now bribe all of Washington D.C. Is that new or news?

This tool helps find the location of a photograph. Great for the good guys. Also a big help for the ne'er-do-wells.

Yet another way to make money: GPUaaS or rent the GPUs you already have to those who didn't buy them back what they were cheaper.

Wednesday 22 January 2025

Notice how the big tech companies only talk about money in terms of Billion$. This is a new reality. The US Federal government is puny in comparison.

I'll just quote, "Microsoft was once the exclusive provider of data center infrastructure for OpenAI to train and run its AI models. No longer. "

Meta, which already builds a type of smart glasses with RayBan, announces plans to work with Oakley on glasses with a display.

Fear and loathing with video game developers.

In the rest of the world, the governors are welcoming big tech and AI work. They aren't losing jobs over regulation. Jobs trump regulation.

Cloudflare claims to have blocked 21.3million DDoS attacks in 2024.

A team of big tech companies aims to build $500Billion in datacenters in the next couple of years.

I guess some people still watch the CBS Evening News. I do when visiting some relatives. After watching 30 minutes of it, I understand why only some people still watch the CBS Evening News.

ByteDance, that Chinese company that owns TikTok, will spend billion$ on AI chips made by Chinese companies.

Google rolls out new Chromebook features including controlling the computer with facial gestures.

In other news, it seems there were a lot of quality problems in the manufacture of medals for last year's Paris Olympics as medals are corroding and simply falling apart.

Wine 10.0 is released.

A call for decentralized social media. Stay away from the billionaire celebrity CEOs. This is America. Go for it! Build it! Do it!

Recent research shows that humans are taller and heavier than a few hundred years ago. What surprises some is that men are growing faster than women in absolution, not percentage numbers.

Thursday 23 January 2025

Be ready for more and more of these stories: Mr. Trump is cutting. People will scream, "but he is cutting this really really important thing!"

People are still complaining about the "Nazi salute" from Mr. Musk. No complaints about the photos of Mr. Obama et al in the same posture.

The quest continues for software that writes software so we can rid ourselves of those pesky computer programmers. Folks have been on this quest for, oh, six or seven decades. Perhaps this time...

This is complicated, but our FBI continues to bend the rules on evidence in attempts to prosecute some folks.

Where the money is: AI apps. Spending was up 200% in 2024.

More complaining about the Nazi salute. Henceforth, bend your elbow, keep you hand below your shoulder, and keep fingers spread. There are probably more style points to emphasize, but that is a good start.

Where the games are: on PCs, not on game consoles. There has been a major shift among game programmers and creators.

Samsung shows new Galaxy phones. $1,000 is the new norm.

Big job cuts in the legacy media. You can drive your audience away for so long and then the accountants show the red ink to the boss.

Meanwhile in China, they are making big strides in AI models.

At this point, Google's Gemini is the leader in the AI agent race.

It is difficult to tell what is happening in Ukraine with the war. This French-trained and equipped brigade was supposed to make a big difference, but, well, nothing but headaches.

Friday 24 January 2025

Not all tech business is great as Texas Instruments reports a down financial year.

Meanwhile in China, a company releases a new AI model that has no information on the incident at Tiananmen Square. This is a fundamental principle of supervised learning systems. Someone is supervising it all, putting items in the training set, and labelling the items as right and wrong.

We no longer care who has the world's tallest building. We now compete for the world's biggest data center. And it appears that India is on track to get that one.

A look at Nvidia's GeForce RTX 5090 GPU --- a $2,000 GPU for desktop PCs. Video gaming? How about AI super duper computing?

Meanwhile in Pakistan, new laws that bring censorship of social media. They don't want everyone publishing news.

ByteDance plans to spend $20Billion (with a B) this year. These major tech companies have that kind of cash. Most of the money will be for AI with half being on buildings and processors.

Our current President signs an Executive Order promoting cryptocurencies.

Quoting, "OpenAI is releasing a research preview of an AI agent called Operator that can go to the web to perform tasks for you." Only those who pay $200 a month have access to it.

Some analysts see a pattern and puzzle fitting together regarding Chinese tech investments.

More angst at OpenAI as they try to untangle from Microsoft and become part for-profit and part non-profit.

The airlines industry, like the college industry, has recovered from the PAN(dem)IC.

Meanwhile in Tanzania, an entrepreneur is making backpacks with solar panels and selling them for about $5. These provide light so that students can study after sundown...something they couldn't do otherwise as electricity is not available.

A new national fire safety regulation is about to render electrical vehicle charging stations useless. Ah, good old government regulation.

Saturday 25 January 2025

Results of an Anaconda study in the use of AI in business. It is growing. Still, many are at a loss to see what they can do.

Should you buy an Nvidia RTX 5090 at $2,000? Video gamers, no. AI programmers, yes.

I love this piece of photograph from Rest of World.

Speculating about DOGE and the US DOGE Service and all that stuff.

The Israel-Gaza conflict saw much closer ties between American tech companies and the Israeli government. This piece is about Microsoft. The last couple of weeks had several pieces about Google.

Meta is supposed to spend over $60Billion (with a B) this year on stuff. $10Billion goes to a datacenter in Louisiana. They also own over a million Nvidia GPUs. Any excess inventory they selling out the back door? Again, the big tech companies have this much cash. This is just what is spent in one year. They could buy half a dozen NFL franchises.

Did you hire any North Korean programmers this year (by mistake)? Too bad for you.

I love this from Seth Godin: An expert is someone who can keep a promise. Point to the results that demonstrate your skill and understanding and commitment and we'll treat you as an expert. Credentials, on the other hand, are awarded to folks who are good at being awarded credentials. We live in a world of certificates and credentials. Someone recently asked me if I had any certificates in AI. I asked if a PhD dissertation counted. It didn't.

National electronic health records take yet another fall as UnitedHealth is hacked and loses its grip on 190million customers' data.

Sunday 26 January 2025

So far, we have this split in news about our current President. The attention of real America is on that app that allows teens to make dance videos. The stuff about lawyers et al in Federal jobs doesn't matter much to anyone outside the Washington, D.C. beltway.

Inside Washington, D.C., the news is about Inspectors General at Federal agencies. Few Americans care.

Outside Washington, D.C., the news is about TikTok which is used by a hundred million or so Americans.

Remember the name of this company: DeepSeek. It is a group of researchers in China that are currently surprising the world with advances in AI.

Predictable and predicted: trade embargos cause local companies to think hard and make due with what they have.

More on DeepSeek and their AI model.

Good site for researchers. Who appears on Techmeme related to AI?

The start is education. Google shows a long-term plan for having AI adopted. The fist step is a $120million education program for kids and lawmakers.

Canoo was a maker of electric vehicles. The keyword is "was."

It appears that Americans are buying more heat pumps. Good luck with that as they don't work in large parts of the country.

Oops. Astronomers see that Tesla Roadster out in space and label it as a asteroid.

Another goof: Microsoft thought folks would like a price increase in Microsoft 365 for the inclusion of more AI. Like I wrote, it was a goof.

Apply more thinking. Researchers show that changing a few lines of code in the Linux OS will reduce datacenter power use by 30%. Hmm. Sounds like a good idea. Also sound like a good area for more experiments and thinking.