AI. Smart machines. Smart everything. It’s all I hear about. In reality, machines aren’t nearly as smart as the media hype makes them out to be. Take robot vacuums. Everything you read makes it sound like they take all the hassle out of house cleaning. Just buy them, download the[…] Read On
Blog Archives
Never Give Up Your Individuality
I was just thinking about 1984. The book, not the year. Orwell’s fear that Big Brother would turn us all into regimented clones turned out to be unfounded. Don’t get me wrong. We do live in an Orwellian dystopia. The sad irony is that we didn’t need Big Government to[…] Read On
Big Tech Meet Big Gov
So much for a business-friendly White House. The feds are going after big-tech over antitrust concerns. The DOJ will take on Apple and Google while the FTC investigates Amazon and Facebook. Is it just me or does that sound a lot like the Mafia carving up old Manhattan? Conspicuous is[…] Read On
Why I Still Won’t Buy an Electric Car
This FOX Business column, “Don’t Buy an Electric Car,” got a lot of attention back in 2013, and not all the good kind. Thought it’d be fun to revisit and see how it’s holding up, what’s changed, yada yada. You be the judge. I live in California, home to all[…] Read On
Congress Confronts Facial Recognition Controversy
When a crime is allegedly committed one of the first things police do is check video footage to try to identify the perpetrator. If they succeed in getting a good image, they now have a pretty good chance of IDing the perp, courtesy off big improvements in facial recognition technology[…] Read On
How Random Events Can Change Your Life
The SAT adversity score controversy reminded me of a story I’ve never told you folks – how a bizarre series of events forever altered the course of my post-collegiate career. The winter of 1977-78 saw the Northeastern United States get pummeled by a series of historic storms. One of them,[…] Read On
Tweet to @Jack Dorsey: Your Loony Biohacks Are Not Working
Jack Dorsey sounds like one messed up dude, IMO. The CEO of Twitter and Square went on some health wacko’s podcast to talk about his bizarro biohacks that include eating only once a day in the evening (a protein and veggies, that’s it) except on weekends when he doesn’t eat[…] Read On