The AI Cold War That Threatens Us All by Nicholas Thompson and Ian Bremmer - Wired Magazine article

In the November 2018 issue of Wired magazine, Nicolas Thompson and Ian Bremmer made a compelling case that we could be headed to a new kind of Cold War.

The future of relations between China and the United States revolves around AI, 5G networks, surveillance and intellectual property rights.

I found the whole article chilling and well thought out.  It extrapolates the near future based on today’s headlines and they even offer an alternative to the direction we seem to be on.

That alternative seems, to me at least, a bit optimistic but it is the best possible outcome.

Take the time to dig out the article.  It satisfied the futurist in me.

The article can be found here - https://www.wired.com/story/ai-cold-war-china-could-doom-us-all/

The Code that Crashed the World by Andy Greenberg - An Article Review

First published in Wired magazine’s September 2018 issue, Andy Greenberg shares an excerpt from his book Sandworm, to expose the damage caused by the Russian cyber attack of June 27, 2017.

The author focused on the damage caused to, and effort to recover from, the hack on the Maersk shipping company.

The whole thing read like an action movie and went to expose just how vulnerable the world’s networked computers are.  I found this to be a fantastic read.  It was also very, very scary.  This is not fiction, this happened and can easily happen again.

On the positive side, you can bet that these vulnerabilities are being addressed.  But it all came about because of apathy - since nothing has happened in the past there was no reason to prepare for the future.  Something we are all guilty of, really.

Whey was the last time you changed your passwords?

Link to the Wired article - https://www.wired.com/story/notpetya-cyberattack-ukraine-russia-code-crashed-the-world/

Andy Greenberg's Wired bio - https://www.wired.com/author/andy-greenberg/

Andy Greenberg

Short Stories and Novellas.

Image from the article.

I read a terrific article on the WIRED website:  HOW TECHNOLOGY SHAPES THE WAY WE READ by some poor, uncredited staff member.  It tells the story of the resurgence of the novella and how it is the perfect format for our society today.

I must say the I completely agree.  I am often overwhelmed by the commitment involved in a series or even stand alone novels.

Way back, when the paperback revolution was underway, books often came in around 150 pages.  These were tightly plotted and sparse that got to the point of things.  But then, in the past few decades, books began to top out over 400 pages, my guess is to justify the cover price; readers wanted quantity over quality.

How often have you read a chapter knowing full well that it is nothing but filler?  I once read a Star Trek novel that took three pages (!) to answer the door.

Anyway, the article was rather liberating to me.  Short stories and novellas are often only available to mystery and science fiction readers in magazines or anthologies.  After reading the piece, I felt I had permission to enjoy myself, to read a short story or novella and appreciate it for what it can be - a story well told.

Although I've given short stories their fair share, here on my humble little blog (usually posted on Wednesdays), I've always felt that it is not "real" reading, you know?  Novels are the thing.  I've often felt that some of the best short stories could have easily been expanded into a novel.  But maybe that's not quite right.  Maybe I liked it so much, because it was just the right length, that it left me wanting more.

I went straight to Chapters Indigo and bought the first TOR.Com ebook that appealed to me.  It was by John Scalzi, more on that in my next post.

Book Review #112 - No Place to Hide, Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Serveillance State by Glenn Greenwald

Book 36 of 52
Page count - 253

The last book I read that scared me was Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm.  This one scared me more because it's happening to all of us.

Here is presented the account, from the journalist who broke the story, of domestic spying by the NSA, of how Edward Snowden blew the whistle and made public this illegal activity.

The first part of the book described how Snowden approached the author to help him reveal the domestic surveillance taking place.  The second part looked more closely at the documents themselves while the third looks at how living in a surveillance society effects the behavior and attitudes of the population.  The last part of the books looks at how journalism in the US has changed over the past decades and just how it's independence has eroded.

It is a chilling story that should make anyone who reads it look at the nightly news and general main stream reporting with a cautious eye.  Everything revealed in the book was previously embedded in my subconscious but it took reading it on the page to make me notice just how journalism favours the government.  We seldom see the rogue journalist chasing corruption.  Instead journalists are threatened personally and the owners of media corporations are coerced to sit on news items, sometimes for months at a time, or prevented from reporting outright.

Anytime you read a book like this you have to take a cautious approach so as not to get sucked in completely by the author.  It's an important part of reporting but it is also a one-sided read.  That said, what is truly important here,  is the fact that these things ARE taking place.  The NSA is gobbling up nearly all communications data on everyone.  The government of the USA is funding and using all this information.  Anything we do online, including reading this review, is tracked and recorded.  Independent journalism is under great threat; there are only a few truly independent reporters left in the world.

But you can't let these revelations scare you into curling up in a ball and giving up on the Internet.  It is also important to know that since the revelations of Snowden have been made public the tide is showing sign of turning.  We live in a period of time that will eventually pass; it is always difficult to have perspective when we are in the middle of things. 

What you will come away with is a new awareness of everything you say and do on-line.  Every time you post on Facebook or do a Google search you will think of what you read in this book.  Maybe it will stop you or maybe it will awaken a need to get a different view of things from sources that are defying the pressure to conform.

Very interesting reading.

You may also be interested in a current article of Snowden from Wired magazine.

August 2014 issue of Wired Magazine - Edward Snowden

For some independent journalism try The Intercept website in which Greenwald is a contributor.

Glenn Greenwald

X Prize founder

I read an inspiring article in the July 2012 issue of Wired magazine.

"X Prize Founder Peter Diamandis has His Eyes on the Future" is a wonderful modern spin on an old custom of encouraging innovation by offering a cash prize.

In the case of the X Prize it was to encourage private access to space.


Diamandis is a forward looking optimist who also wrote a book that I'll probably buy very soon. The book is called "Abundance; The Future Is Better Than You Think"

The article can be read HERE


Wired magazine is HERE

Peter Diamandis Wikipedia page is HERE

The X Prize webpage is HERE

The book can be found HERE