Blog-O-Matic Automation

There were not many news items this last week that affected the Internet of Things.  A few, to be sure:

• New laws on how ISPs can sell browsing data
• A sale at Lowes on GE Z-Wave switches (most likely gone thanks to people like yours truly).

Of course, there was also the usual horde of investor articles that seem to rehash the same points: security, cost savings (or not) and how it will affect jobs.  I generally ignore most of those because they rarely say anything new and that bores me (and I write articles that are at least three times longer than the usual Buzzfeed crap, so I rank my attention span as better than the average internet goldfish).

But, as usual, something did catch my eye: another question on Reddit, in the /r/singularity section.  "Will Artificial Intelligence Replace Content Writers in the Future?"  Most of the comments are pro human: "Content for mindless dribble, 100% yes."  And that's a sentiment with which I mostly agree.  For ad copy and other boiler plate kinds of content (financial reports, etc), it may already have taken over.  Which is great, because most of us humans don't like writing that stuff (though we'll cash the check for the work).

What about 'real' content: long form, creative writing?  For the purposes of this article, we'll take 'creative' to mean fiction, opinion and in-depth reporting all of which require a creative use of language to keep the reader's attention.  What some of the articles on AI writing start calling 'soul' or 'heart'.  As someone who holds a BA in English, I want to dive into what that 'soul' is.

The current state of AI writing bots appear to be good at highly formulaic prose, hence the financial reports and legal briefs and other content that for whatever reason needs to stay within strict bounds.  Anywhere that a dropped comma can cost a company millions needs something with a superhuman attention to detail and legal exposure.  The current AI systems should be perfect for this.

However, to keep a reader's attention (and if you've made it this far, then I'm not too bad at it) requires not only following grammar rules, but also knowing when to break them.  I have a Greek chorus of writing instructors that scream in my ear every time that I start a sentence with 'And'.  And yet I do it often because it sounds 'right' to my inner ear.

In fact, most of us appreciate rule breaking in writing because it makes the writing more interesting.  It has to be done carefully and with intent, but that is what second and third (and fourth) drafts are for.  This is why it will be difficult for AI to 'own' content creation.  All artistic disciplines have these rules and all of them reward those artists that break them with intent.

Ultimately, this is because successful formulas become boring with repetition.  In our present pop culture zeitgeist, this is most obvious in summer tent pole blockbuster movies.  The current reigning champ is Disney/Marvel with their MCU which is going on nine years of movies since Iron Man was released in 2008.  Disney has also had success with family animation movies and princess movies and theme park rides.  Much is because they do have a formula, The Hero's Journey.  Yet, they do no slavishly follow all of its beats.  They mix it up, eventually pitting hero against hero in order to make the formula feel fresh (keep in mind that Civil War is really a Captain America movie, so all of the other Avengers in the film are there to distract us from the formula of Cap's journey).

Will AI be able to break the rules with intent?  No doubt some clever boffin will figure out the algorithm to make that happen.  Then Michael Bay will only need to enter a brief and a few actors' names, press a button and have another Transformers movie.  One that will make enough money to allow him to press the button again and again until the formula becomes old.  And there's the point.  New formulas require people to feed them into the AI.  New rules to implement and then break.

At least, they will as long as the AIs are writing for humans.  As soon as they start creating for themselves and their interests, then all of the rules are out the window.

The Ocarina of Control

The inspiration for this week's post comes from a reddit post. Or repost that got better traction.  For those of you who don't follow links in articles (shame on you... so I'll embed it below), these show a video/animated gif of a guy who can control his home through the tunes he plays on an Ocarina.  And that is trés cool.

But how long will he live with it?

Our intrepid YouTuber, 'Sufficiently Advanced', no doubt did this for a few reasons:

• As an exercise in programming
• To see if he could
• To jump on the 'Breath of the Wild' coat tails (which he admits in the video comments)
• Because it is insanely cool

However, I argue that he did not do it because it is PRACTICAL.  For most of us, home automation is not about being cool (or at least not only about being cool... in the same sense that squealing the tires is cool), it's about making our homes easier to live in.  Setting aside the massive security breach around whistling at the window, this project does not make living easier.

Remote Control or Automation

Using an Ocarina to control your home requires you to 1) have an Ocarina, 2) know how to play an Ocarina, and 3) hope no one else with those first two requirements know where you live.  Even with all three of those met, it is nothing more than a fancy remote control for the home.  In fact, most 'Smart' home systems are nothing more than fancy remote controls, albeit with app-to-hub authentication and fewer wires hanging around.  It reminds me of a post I wrote for Qioto last September that focused on the mental progression of a smarthome DIYer.  Because you won't click on that either, the TL;DR is:

The ultimate goal should be for the home to know what you want without having to reach in your pocket for anything, but that not all home systems are right for that level of automation.

It is not yelling at Alexa or the Google Assistant to "Turn on the Kitchen Lights."  That is useful, but not automated.  Instead, the system should know that you are in the kitchen and that it is dark outside so it should turn on the lights for you.  Then turn them off when you leave (or maybe a minute or two after you leave).

Not Quite There

To do that requires that there be motion sensors and smart switches and a controlling hub, all of which exist, but none of which really work 100% reliably.  The motion sensor needs to be in the right place, or there needs to be many of them to cover the area.  All of the lights need to be connected to smart switches and those all need to be linked to the motion sensors and a sunrise-sunset timer via the hub to make that work.  Alternatively, this can be worked out by location mapping our phone locations within the home, but GPS doesn't work well inside and the consumer version only resolves to about five meters (and Wi-Fi location mapping is not really there yet).

All of these things will become easier.  Many of the better systems (ones where the owners can afford to hire professionals to constantly troubleshoot it) can do it already.  Even the DIY systems say they can do it, but my experience is that they can only do it in very controlled conditions.

Until the reliability of smart home systems improves, take your smartphone (or Ocarina) with you.  It's dangerous to go alone.

WikiLeaks Distract-O-Rama

After two weeks of speculative writing on UI/UX for direct-to-brain interfaces, it's time to come back to what's happening in the present.  And it is so much fun!

The big news this last week in the on-line world and connected devices was the Vault 7 release from WikiLeaks.  Over 8,000 pages of stuff, much of it detailing the tools that the CIA used to spy on people.  Many of those tools targeted smartphones, smart cars and smart TVs; not the laptops and servers that are the staples of Hollywood Cyber Hacking.  

(Courtesy USA Network via the kind soul who posted it to YouTube)

In other words, the CIA has been targeting the Internet of Things.  According to WikiLeaks.  Who may or may not be in cahoots with Russia or the Trump Administration or not the Trump Administration. Or maybe Brexit?

Putting aside the loyalties of an institution who's primary aim is to "... give asylum to these [persecuted] documents, we analyze them, we promote them and we obtain more,” what we need to know is whether or not the CIA is spying on us through our TVs.  Are they?  Won't someone please tell me so I can enjoy my mindless drivel in peace?

Most experts seem to think that the short answer is "no, the CIA is not spying on you."  The longer answer adds a bunch of addendum: if you are an American citizen living in the USA, then it is illegal of the CIA to spy on you.  Because the legality of the CIA's operations is something that the American people have learned to trust, right?  Right?

If you are not an American or an American not in America, the the CIA might have used some of these tool to find out if you are doing things counter to the interests of America (sentence needs more America.)  Otherwise, it's not the CIA you need to worry about.  It's the NSA and the FBI and the ATF and the HSA, maybe the ICE or the FCC or the FTA (probably not FTD, but don't count them out).  Who knows how many of these 'tools' have been shared?

BUT THAT'S NOT REALLY THE POINT

All of this brouhaha about WikiLeaks may be true (most likely), but why now?  They have been promoting Vault 7 for a while.  Why release it now?  From what are we being distracted?  Here's some of the things that are happening while we all stare at Assange's 'sexy' face.

• Changes to the FCC Net Neutrality Rules that may allow ISPs to sell users' search histories.
• The Trump-Putin Connection (alleged).
• The Republican Health Care plan (not very successfully)

WikiLeaks can serve a purpose.  They can expose things to the public that are in the public's best interest to know.  But they can also do those things in such a manner that is NOT in the public's best interest.  This may be one.

We all need to keep an eye on everything that's going on and not be distracted by one story.

Neural UI: Beyond the Lace

Last week, I took it upon myself to offer unsolicited advice on the User Interface for the coming direct-to-brain technologies.  Because no one reached out to offer me millions of dollars to continue bashing my thoughts in this keyboard... I'll just have to offer more for free.  #badprecedent

Over the week, while not being offered speaking engagements, I have continued to noodle on the problem and have realized that I did not take the whole concept of "interface" far enough.  Last week's idea that "seeing" or "hearing" or "touching" as essential paradigms for a UI become bottlenecks when the brain is connected only works as long as the thoughts stay in natures own little ATX computer case: the skull.  But what should this all look like (crap it's hard to get away from visual metaphors as a human) when the thought process has been copied out of the brain and is 'running' on a different medium?

(image and case credit to user Masbuskado on Overclock.net)

That's right, I'm talking about running "you" on silicon or quantum computers or Minecraft Redstone or whatever.  Because if we will be able to implant thoughts into your head via neural laces or neural shunts, then it is not much of a jump to start pulling them out and storing them externally.  I want to set all of the issues around identity and 'which you is you' and 'if you have a copy running after you die, does it inherit your estate' all aside in order to focus on what that copy will experience when running on a computer.

Science Fiction authors have tackled this stuff for more than a few years.  Most of them offer up images similar to the ones in Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash or the Otherland series from Tad Williams.  The Matrix.  A visual world.  Granted, both of those worlds can only be experienced through the body via goggles or immersion rigs and were not intended to imaging a brain tap style connection.  Others take a more leave-your-body-behind approach and divide humanity between those who have uploaded and those who remain hide bound.  Most of these latter still stick to a world recreated; one of visions and sounds and surfaces.

But is that what will actually be experienced?  When uploaded, the mind is now in a different body, one with different senses.  Does it need to be coddled by some concept world similar to what it has been used to?  Maybe initially, to get over the shock, but I posit that, in the long term, that will all be left behind to something intensely different.

Alastair Reynolds had some of this towards the end of his first novel, Revelation Space, where the uploaded characters only recreate a virtual world when they have visitors.  That seems nice.  Unfortunately, Reynolds is sparse on details about what he thinks those people experience when they don't have visitors.  Is it just extended thinking with your eyes closed?  Long term meditation on the nature of self and reality?  Long term sensory deprivation?

Not that last, at least.  There will be sensors to the outside world.  We are all in the process of installing them right now: IP cams, microphones and connected smoke alarms to mention a few.  The difference will be the immediacy of it.  Our current senses are tied directly to our location.  We can only sense what is around us.  A mind in a computer will have a different sense of presence.  On the one hand, the sensors that it has access to will be even more location tied.  Cameras will swivel and tilt, but not move around.  On the other hand, that presence will also be distributed with access to sensors everywhere all at once.  Moving from place to place will be as easy as willing it.  Teleportation in a real sense.

Or continuing to do the same menial task... but as a robot!

But beyond the senses, what will it be like?  Will the mind's ability to think change merely because it is thinking on a different strata?  I suspect so.  Thoughts will be different.  They will have to be.  For instance, now, when we close our eyes, we still see: we visualize.  When we thinking on a computer, will we still think in terms of 'seeing' or will it be something else?

As intensely physical beings embedded in organic bodies, it is difficult to imagine a world in which physicality no longer exists.  Some poor soul (#punintended) is going to have to DO it before we can know.  Hopefully, that soul has something of the poet so that they can properly articulate their experience back to those of us still stuck with ears.

I'll volunteer myself, but only as a copy.  I still enjoy living in this physical world.

Neural UI

I saw a post on Reddit asking about what life will be like wearing a Neural Lace and it got me thinking.  A bit about societal affects, a bit about security, but more about the User Interface.

(Hey, look! Reused original artwork from YT!)

For those who don't subscribe to /r/singularity or /r/futurology (or have been escaping their hum-drum lives through science (speculative) fiction for over thirty years), a Neural Lace is one of a couple of potential Mind-Computer interfaces.  It is imagined as a fine net of circuits that is draped over one's head and influences the brain through very close range radio signals.  Think of it as your smartphone as a hair net.

It is not the only potential direct-to-brain interface.  The other one that is knocked around is the Neural Shunt: a surgically implanted plug that allows you to jack the Internet into your brain.  A bit more invasive and a lot less reversible, which is why people like Elon Musk (obligatory fanboy 'squee!') are having their people look into Neural Laces.  But either way, the big question is how we will interact with this new information vector.

Eyes?  We don't need no stinkin' Eyes!

Most people immediately start thinking of glass-less Heads-Up Displays.  We will see information laid over our vision: direction arrows, info boxes around people, prices drifting over products.  These are all of the things that Augmented Reality is promising, but through goggles or glasses or contact lenses.  And maybe that is the first step.  Presumably, voice assistants will be part of this, so we'll ask (maybe outloud, maybe via subvocalization), "Where is the closest Starbucks?" and directions will be start appearing in our vision.

But then everything has to go through our visual cortex before it is processed by the rest of our brains.  Having information read back to us is no better, it just swaps the visual cortex for the auditory one.  Both are bottlenecks.  Instead, the UI should be more intuitive.  In fact, it should only be intuitive.  Think about how you 'know' the way to your work or home or parent's house or your favorite restaurant.  Rarely do you visualize it.  Or, at least, I don't.  I only start to visualize directions if I have to change them to get around traffic or road construction or something.  Even then, there is no overlay, just me thinking inside my head as pictures.  The eyes are not involved.

Just Know It (It's gotta be the lace!)

That will be the most powerful and most dangerous part of whatever Mind-Machine interface happens (and it will happen).  The slowest part of the interaction will be removed: input and output.  Just think what you want out into the Inter-webs.  No more typing, texting, talking, or any of that.  Your thoughts are intimately connected to the world.  Think a question, know the answer.  Do you want to know Kung Fu?  Then know Kung Fu.  Are you thinking about sending an email?  It was just sent.

(Not OC.  Copyright, Warner Brothers)

And that's the danger, too.  At least one of them.  Not only is our conscious mind connected, but so will our subconscious mind.  Our brains will be thinking at the rest of the world and with more than the things we think we'er thinking, but also all of the things we don't know (or won't consciously admit) that we're thinking.

(Copyright, DEG, Inc.)

If you think that the crazy social media posts are bad when people have to take the time to actually type them, wait until they have them connected to all of the different layers of their psyche!

Thought Crime

That takes care of the human output to the rest of the connected world.  What about the information that we will be receiving?  Set aside the 'truthiness' of that information (Wow! the spell checker knew 'truthiness') and how we validate that the information that we received is correct, and think instead about more malicious stuff.  Information viruses may (will) take on new dimensions of OMG.

Someone will quickly figure out how to wipe a mind via one of these devices.  Someone else will figure out how to 'Incept' a thought or suggestion.  They may even beat the person who figures out the full erase.  Then someone else will figure out how to network minds together and create a botnet of actual brains.  Then Ed Wood's uploaded persona will make "Attack of the Internet Zombies!"

There are a few potential solutions to all of this, but none of them are ready yet (neither are Neural Laces, so there is time).  Bitcoin for thoughts comes to mind, as does DRM for the brain.  Not perfect, but better than finding yourself part of a DDoS attack on the the mind of the US President.

Again, this will be a society changing technology similar to the personal computer and the smart phone.  Many things will become easier.  New opportunities and dangers will pop up.  In the end, it will not make us better or worse.  Just different.

In the mean time, I considering shaving my head in preparation.  I just need to remember where all of the moles and bumps are so I don't slice them off with the razor.

What Are We Learning For?

This week was a fun week in the House O' Schmoid.  One of the Middle School Daughter Unit's teachers sent home an email that she was getting dangerously behind on a project.  I would not have freaked out too much if this had been the first time, but sadly... no.  This led to a series of conversations with teachers and grandparents and ex-wives and... eventually with the MSD herself.  Everyone agreed with the importance of education and learning how to learn.  Even the MSD.  Of course, after 'adulting', I spent some time thinking about what kinds of expectations I was setting up for her.

All I Wanted Was a Pepsi

We've all heard the 'what are you going to do with your life' speeches from various parents and counselors and therapists and institutional learning facilities.  That all of what we learn in school is going to be useful later when we have to earn a living.  And even the stuff that seems useless (the Pythagorean theorem is the usual whipping boy, but I've actually used that a few times a year), is useful in what it teaches around problem solving and the creation of good study habits.  And I certainly did my part to land all of that with the MSD.  But, in the face of mass automation of the work force and the potential of a 'post-work' society, are all of those worn parental speeches still valid?

I wrote about some of this last week around the context of the Superb Owl and concluded that highly specialized entertainment skills like those used in American Football might be safe from automation.  However, I was unable to come to any conclusion for the rest of us more average human specimen.  And then I see stuff like:

with its spacial awareness and fast reflexes and extra articulation and I start to wonder exactly what reasons can be fed to a twelve-year old that are truthful motivations.

What Jobs of the Future?

Higher level thinking jobs are turning out to be some of the first to go.  Watson is doing a better job diagnosing cancers than 'real' doctors.  And it's not the only one.  Banks are using bots to help with personal finance and to stop fraud, taking out both customer service and law enforcement with one set of automation.  That's on top of the heavy automation going into factory and menial service jobs.

(courtesy Fastcompany.com)

Going a step farther and looking at some of the jobs that are projected to be hot in ten years, and most of those are already well on their way to being automated.  Small plot farm bots exist.  Medicine at all levels, from nurse to surgeon to researcher, is quickly getting automated because it minimizes mistakes.  Even 'sex worker coach' is being replaced by waifu pillows and ubiquitous internet porn.

One Word: Repair

As a parent, it is hard to make a serious argument for focused life direction.  I've considered recommending that she finish high school and not go to college, but go to a trade school.  Something like plumbing or carpentry or becoming an electrician.  While there is a lot of automation going on in those fields as well, most of it is in new construction.  Not repair.  All of the pipes and wires and boards in our homes and offices will break.  And they will break in such a way that an automated, task specific contraption will not be able to fix it.  Or at least not at the same price as one of the hoards of out-of-work laborers.

Of course, those jobs are not sexy.  They don't have the panache of an athlete or movie star or Wall Street type (or internet blogger).  They are so not sexy that there is already a shortage in the skilled trades.  Which just means that those that can will charge more.  Thanks, Invisible Hand.

With all of that said, telling a pre-teen girl who is into drawing and guitar and wearing fedoras that she should be an electrician was not something I dropped into the 'get your work done' conversation.  Even those jobs (maybe, especially those jobs) require the critical thinking, planning and attention to detail that school work is supposed to help teach.

If it's properly funded and attracts the right teachers... but we won't need to worry about that because the teachers will all be Test Bots, Amazon Alexa and YouTube videos.

And with that, I'll head back to 'adulting'.

The Human Bowl

I apologize for not giving you your weekly dose of Schmoid last week, but I had the opportunity to go skiing at Alta, UT (my favorite ski area) which meant less time for writing.  With that out of the way...

Happy American Sports Advertising Day!

I recognize that you are reading this on a Monday and that either Boston or Atlanta is celebrating city wide an achievement accomplished by 53 players plus associated coaches.  But I'll set aside the Illusion of Awesomeness Transference (IAT?  I'll have to work on that) and see if I can pull something IoT related out of the Superb Owl.

(source image)

Blitz the Robot

And, look!  I can!  And it's about jobs!  Oh, joy!  Many of the jobs that were once thought to be safe from automation are now being threatened.  From Wall Street stock pickers to truck driver to fast food service jobs, automation is taking over.  Even artistic endeavors are coming under attack.  All of which begs the question:

Are there any jobs that are safe from automation?

That's where the Super Bowl comes in.  (Most) Sports are safe from automation.  While it is possible to build robots that can run and jump and throw and move better than humans, it would make the sports pointless.   Something that can perform actions flawlessly every time becomes boring to watch very quickly.  What makes sports worth doing and worth watching is that we can relate to the human on the field doing something incredible, know that we cannot do it and marvel at their achievement.  With the robot, it quickly becomes "Oh, of course it can do that.  It's a robot."  And with that, we all switch off the game and the ad revenue dries up.  It is the imperfect striving for the perfect that inspires us, not the perfect being perfect.

An example of this is Battle Bots, the TV show that pitted remote controlled motorized devices against each other in a gladiatorial contest.  While not truly 'robotic' (the machines were not autonomous), it did not take long for the designer/pilots to figure out that low wedge flipping bots were offered the highest chance of winning.  From there, it was a matter of who could build the most maneuverable bot with the lowest front edge to their wedge, get it under the competitor and put them on their back.  The crazy saws and hammers and flame throwers that looked fabulous in promos turned out to be almost useless.  So the show got boring.  So the show got cancelled.  Twice.

We Can't All Be Athletes

The problem is that only those that are really close to perfect are worth using to sell beer and cars and nachos.  Everyone else is only interesting if they are related to you in some way.  The entire city of San Mateo, CA did not shut down and throw a party every time Tom Brady played football in High School.  I'm guessing, based entirely on my own lack of giving a sh** during that portion of my life, that not even the whole school showed up.

So, for those of us that aren't good at sports, how are we supposed to live if all of the other jobs have had humans automated out of them?  As with all things, there's some good news and some bad news.

The Good News

The reason to automate most things is because it allows for them to be made/accomplished for less money.  That means that the goods and services provided should become cheaper.  We won't need as much money to afford the basics because those basics will be cheaper.

But who wants to live on just the basics?  There is some good news there, too.  Even the mid-level luxury items should come down in price, not just because their production has been automated, but because...

The Bad News

... we won't have enough money to afford them if they don't.  If robots take all of the jobs and jobs are how we are expected to make money and money is how we continue to manage our economy, then there won't be any money for people to buy anything.  It won't matter how low the price is, no one (except the highest level athletes) will have anything to exchange for those goods and services.

The Even Worse News

The worst part is that we need this automation.  Not for the luxury goods, but for the subsistence level stuff.  With 7.5 Billion people on this planet (and growing), humans alone can no longer grow enough food to feed everyone.  We cannot care for the sick and elderly relying on just ourselves.  Sanitation, public safety, transportation, shelter.  None of it can be made on the necessary scale to deal with the growing population without automation.  We need automated fertilizer systems for agriculture.  We need elderly care bots.  We need home construction bots.  There are simply too many of us to manage it any other way.

But...

There are other solutions, but they are so draconian that they are barely worth mentioning.  Who gets to decide who gets to have children?  Who gets to decide who gets to live where?  Who gets to decide who deserves health care and who does not?  None of those things are going to happen.  At least not easily or quickly or on the global scale necessary for any real change to happen.  And would we want to live in that world if we did?  Fewer people also means fewer ideas and thoughts and ... athletes striving for perfection.

I don't have an ultimate answer to this dilemma.  Universal Basic Income is a start, but where will that money come from?  Tax the manufacturers and their robots just so people can afford the things that the robots make?  That sounds like a vicious cycle that will not end well.  But it may be a necessary step to a post-monetary society.  Not socialist, necessarily, but something else where people are freed from the basic grind to find food and water and shelter and health.  Where they can strive for something more.

This is Schmoid, signing off to go strive for my own perfection.