State will appeal in Pistorius 'murder' trial: a backgrounder

Posted on October 27, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

After 'bladerunner' Pistorius got off with a relatively light sentence of five years the state prosecutor Nell announced today that they will appeal. No doubt most South-Africans will be happy as the idea that he would get away with possibly just 10 months in jail didn't go well.

The reason for the light sentence was that the judge didn't find Pistorius guilty of premeditated murder, in other words she was convinced he didn't have the intention to kill his girlfriend Reevan Steenkamp. Understandable as there were only two witnesses and one is dead now and the other not willing to testify against himself. Circumstantial evidence wasn't considered strong enough to convict him from willingly murdering Reeva.

However the presiding judge also ruled that he didn't have the intention to kill the person in the toilet. He shot four times through the door from close range which experts agree is very likely to kill any person sitting or standing there. In so called 'Dolus eventualis' you are guilty of non-premeditated murder if could foresee that your action is very likely to kill someone. She found the state not convincing in proving this.

Now South-African law is quite different as an appeal doesn't mean the trial will be done all over again. You can only appeal on an issue of law; very similar to Supreme Court appeals or whatever the name of the highest court in any legislation. State prosecutor Nell will claim that the judge was wrong in interpreting this dolus eventualis. Pistorius could have know that shooting into a small cubicle would kill whoever was behind that door.

So we won't see a new parade of all the witnesses, no vomiting Pistorius, no heated cross-examinations. It will be a discussion about interpreting law. No doubt disappointing for the millions who followed the trial and have their own opinions on the guilt of bladerunner.

These very public trials where journalists and cameras record every word, every emotion inevitably lead to an opinion on the guilt of the protagonist. The public doesn't take a month to study all the witness statements in the cool of a judicial chamber. The public verdict is made up based on emotions: how believable is the defendant, how sympathetic the victim, how convincing the rhetoric of the lawyers.

Do you have an opinion on the guilt of Pistorius or do you accept whatever the appeal court decides? And should people always be held responsible for murder when firing at close range #Politics

 
Posted in Politics | 24 Comments

Why you should join Tsu, the first paying social network, even if you're not interested in the money at all

Posted on October 22, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

It's raining men social networks lately (Ello, Diaspora, Medium and many more) and most of them are bound to fail. Not because they don't have a compelling idea which drives them and makes them truly social, but because the network part is the hard part.

Networks need scale and they need it fast. Look at the one successful newcomer G +, which with all the backing of Google, after three years still struggles in getting your friends and family on board. A new social network like Ello will never reach the needed critical mass and will implode whatever the great intentions driving it.

However, there is a new kid on the block and it's capable of disrupting the social network sphere. Not with an appeal on your social values or a guarantee to stay clear of big business, but with a promise to fill your pockets.

Tsu (apparently pronounced Sue…) starts with a new paradigm. It's a platform for your content, posts/videos/photos stays yours (so no copyright transfers / hand over all your rights as usual) and it's monetized by you.

Now that's quite a revolutionary change. Try find another platform where you keep owning the content after you share it. Ah wait, your personal blog of course! Except that although the content stays yours, monetization is quite hard. Running successful adword campaigns on personal blogs is not that easy.

Tsu offers to take care of the ads in exchange for 10% of the revenue instead of your soul a lousy adword deal on a rarely visited blog. An interesting offer for quality content providers or not?

Well for most of us it means we would earn pennies a year so money is still not a compelling argument. If you care about your content you want foremost the best environment to present it and a network like G+ is hard to beat.

Great visuals, large and really interested audience, searchable and findable by Google search. What more could you want?

As an active content producer myself I would say there are things missing on facebook and G+. Just ignoring that neither of us is paid to post, what's missing are things like 'analytics'. How many eyeballs are seeing our posts? We don't know, we don't get the tools and only by very indirect tools like including an image in every post we get an impression if our post is read at all.

Sure since spring 2014 Google shows 'views' but it's not willing to tell us what it means. Seen in the stream, longer than 0.1 second, part of a WordPress default install or really clicked upon and seen by real people. Most of us got a bump of 100.000's or even tens of millions of views mid September. A week later they were gone.

We don't know. We are not allowed to know. All requests to clarify at least the September bump went unheard. Google is deaf for the one thing we content providers want most: feedback.

We stumble in the dark. We post and thanks to sites like +CircleCount we have a vague idea how many plusses (likes), shares and 'views' we got over time, but content producing on G+ is mostly feeding a black box. We can't expect Google to pay content providers for G+ content as long as they don't show ads on the network. Fair enough.

But why are we left in the dark in terms of engagement? If you run a Google owned blogger platform you get statistics and monetization options. If you run a YouTube channel you get detailed stats and a decent chance to make money out of it if you're successful so why is the social network G+ excluded from it?

I for one am happy to see a social network which solves this. I don't mind if I get 0.0001 cent per view or a quarter per comment although I would prefer the latter :), but I do appreciate that Tsu gives you real feedback. The availability of real analytics is in itself a reason to start posting there.

We all have an ego and want to see a reward for our content. Most of us are much more motivated by feedback than by upfront money, but a network which offers both is truly disruptive and deserves to grow

part two will delve deeper into Tsu and the apparently Multi Level Marketing model underlying it. My first impression: it's actually generating worth so no MLM, but they could take a lesson in basic math…

#Tsu #blogging #content #SocMed

 
Posted in Social Media | Tagged , , , | 104 Comments

If disaster struck and mankind had to start again, would we do it faster?

Posted on October 20, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

As a thought experiment to see how important inventions and knowledge actually are: imagine a world where we lost all tools and had to restart again, but this time with the knowledge we now have. How fast would we be back at the technological level of today?

Assume an earth-scale disaster leaving only modern day people (so we dismiss possible evolution in intelligence), an environment similar to earth, say 10.000 years BC so that we are certified free of the last ice age, and -remarkable – a copy of Wikipedia (or sufficient people to represent this knowledge).

Would we be capable to progress much faster the next time round? Or would we be bound again by the painfully slow process of gathering sufficient food to even start working on technological progress?

Let's take an example: we learned a lot about food over fifty millenia, but it wouldn't really help us hunting. We probably lost more skills there than we won and Wikipedia surely won't help us catch a bear. However there are more ways to make a sustainable living and farming is well understood now.

In this assumed second-coming we don't need to wait until Mendel was done crossing peas and learning about genetics. We know it works, we know what to look for and we could be breeding cattle within a generation. Or can't we because our cows would be eaten by wolves and bears and we can't get rid of them as we don't have guns or even proper fences?

Well we now know how to make steel so why don't we skip that whole stone age? Guns might be a bit difficult but iron would be good enough for decent fences to keep the foxes out.

The recipe is easy enough: smelt iron ore (we would know where to find it tnx to Wiki) in a hot oven with enough carbon and out comes so called pig iron. All you need is a way to get the fire hot enough and those stone-agers already knew to light a fire.

Admittedly it needs to be hotter than your average campfire but unlike our predecessors we know this so we could make a clay oven right away, pump oxygen into the fire with improvised bellows (we have cow skin remember) and process the brittle pig iron into usable steel.

Or couldn't we? As we need hammers to change the unusable iron into something resembling steel and we skipped the stone age remember. Oh and steel is a hopeless material for a technological backward society ('us' in this thought experiment) as it's actually to hard to work with without tools we can't produce without … steel.

To make complex forms and even think about machinery you need to cast iron or bronze as our ancestors did as a first step. They used bronze because it melted at a lower temperature, was soft enough to model when it was cold and was harder than your basic pure iron.

However these complex forms could only be sculpted thanks to experienced artisans who had learned their trade over generations working wood and clay. If you can't create a mold with a high precision even a simple engine is out of reach.

This all started after seeing a video of someone casting his own engine block in his backyard. That led to interest in the history of steel production which like most 'ancient' technologies popped up all over the globe with sometimes thousands of years apart between regions. Before I knew I was pondering on the question how important knowledge and inventions actually are.

Do you think we could re-invent ourselves much faster thanks to all the ideas, inventions and experience mankind accumulated or are we like children who have to go through all the phases?

#progress #tech

Posted in Tech Posts | Tagged | 26 Comments

See what happens when kids grow up in a world of racial stereotypes

Posted on October 18, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

The video shows a repeat of an old experiment where children can chose between two dolls. See these black children demonstrate a complete lack of self-esteem or even outright self-hatred by choosing a white doll (the 'nice one') over a black one while they are perfectly aware of their own skin color.

If all you hear and see are images where a black skin is linked with violence, crime and poverty, it's no wonder young kids already disassociate themselves of their own color.

The original 1940s experiment by Kenneth and Mamie Clark led to the famous High Court decision to forbid racial school segregation. This small scale repetition of the experiment shows we still have a long way to go.

The relevance for my own country of birth, the Netherlands, is that the national debate about 'Zwarte Piet', a blackface helper to the December celebration of 'Sinterklaas' is really important for black all children.

Black Pete is mostly played by white people, using black makeup, over the top afro wigs, golden earrings and large red lips. They act 'funny' by pretending to be stupid, while jumping around in an energetic way.

They act as the little helpers to the wise, white, bearded Saint Nicolas who arrives on his even more white high horse…

The contrast can't be bigger and the stereotyping can hardly be more over the top. Complaints by the relatively small black community in the Netherlands are mostly put aside as 'it's all good fun and don't spoil the party for the children'.

Maybe watching this little experiment helps realize defenders of this tradition realize that stereotyping does make children suffer.

Racism goes much deeper than skin; it really is a brain disease

#ZwartePiet #BlackPete #racism #Politics

Posted in Politics | Tagged , , | 28 Comments

TGIF For Nerds: going through today's Android 5 / Lollipop release

Posted on October 17, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

This Friday developers finally got their hands on the final software development kit (SDK) for Android 5.0 as well as the latest preview software for Nexus phones.

End users will have to wait a few more weeks (or months depending on their phone brand) to see what Android 5 is all about, but the video below already gives a good first impression of the new features.

The new notification system will interest most users. The biggest change out of the box is that notifications are now visible without unlocking your phone. Even more, you can immediately act on them by answering an email or sharing a print screen.

It does save from you from constantly entering patterns or codes, but it's also a huge inroad on your privacy if you leave the phone unattended on the table for just a few minutes. Sex texting will never be the same once your co-workers join in the fun…..

From the looks of it, the new 'Material Design' is more expressive, richer and it offers a lot of little animations helping in getting feedback from the interface.

The color scheme and contrasts are hugely improved over the earlier Android L preview and there is a welcome choice between a light and a darker look as well as options to go back to the older Holo theme.

It looks much better and more mature than the candy look of iOS8.

Missing are new and updated apps. Google will probably use its Play Store to get these ready for prime time. That's the huge advantage of the new model introduced after the KitKat release.

Have a look yourself. What do you think?

P.S. I have watched several videos so my opinion is not just based on these 7 minutes by fellow Gplusser +Tim Schofield

#Android5 #Lollipop #AndroidL #Tech

Posted in Tech Posts | Tagged , , | 15 Comments

Good to see Apple valuing intelligence for a change ;)

Posted on October 16, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

As of today you get a $100 discount in the Apple store if you can remember a four digit pin code!

The newly announced iPad mini 3 is apparently identical to the old mini except for a fingerprint scanner. If your memory is good enough to store the 4 digits of a passcode, you can do without it and you save $100.

Or in an interesting twist: if you have a working memory, you get 16 GB extra digital memory and still pocket $50 when you buy the Mini 2 instead of todays new model.

Is the iPad Mini 2 suddenly the smartest tablet deal in town?
#Tech

 
Posted in Tech Posts | 12 Comments

We have been shortchanged on privacy by Google

Posted on October 15, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

There is a lot of money to be made by selling our privacy so the business model of app developers often relies on harvesting your private data. Enter the world of app privacy controls….

We have all been there: installing a simple app (say a flashlight) which demands access to all our location, contacts and photos, wants to use the microphone and camera and insists on using the internet for itself while sending texts on our costs.

The even more sneaky apps install with a normal list of permissions, but on the first update extend this enormously.

Most users just say accept without even scrolling down the list, but some of us would like to control what an app can do on our phone. Happy to let the flashlight app control the camera flash, but why give it access to our contacts or location to resell these data to an unknown third party.

For a short period Android (4.2.2) offered exactly this possibility to control the permissions of apps. You could allow or deny individual permissions. If you went too far, the app stopped working, but in most cases you got the functionality you wanted without the intrusion on your privacy.

App Ops was brilliant and applauded by privacy organization EFF, but rapidly removed by Google. This control by users was not ‘ready for prime-time’ so there was hope it would return in Android 5.

Unfortunately it’s missing from today’s announcements. What we got in terms of privacy is default encryption (nice if you lose your phone) and so called SELinux which will help against malware and controls access on a system level but it’s not user controlled.

However Android 5 / Lollipop won’t protect you against the software you install yourself. Lots of apps are basically malware as they only exist to spy on you and sell your privacy, but you were the one who accepted the long list of ‘permissions’ so officially it was your choice to sell out.

Android 5 offers us a security lollipop while we need actual user control over apps. Disappointing that Google didn’t dare to break the business model of sneaky apps

What would be your choice: fine control with the slight risk that the installed app won’t work as expected or the current black and white model of ‘accept all’ versus ‘don’t install’?

#LolliPop #Android #Privacy #Tech

Posted in Tech Posts | Tagged , , | 123 Comments

Google will never harm consumers [unless they are Windows phone users?]

Posted on October 12, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

Google says it would never harm an end-user over a conflict with a competitor. In an interview Eric Schmidt is asked if he can imagine Google doing something similar to Amazon: refusing to sell books of publisher Hachette over a commercial conflict.

Would Google ever do that something like that?

[Schmidt] Well, let’s ask the question: Has Google ever done that? Has Google ever done that—in a market, exclude one competitor from an end user service? I think the answer is no.

If it came up in a meeting, would this be one of those things that someone would immediately say. “This is evil?”

[Schmidt] Somebody would say why are we penalizing that group over this business issue? That would be how the debate would occur.

Interesting but why then is Google blocking the YouTube app for Windows Phone? It's a long story, but the summary is that even after Microsoft and Google worked together on a new YouTube app, it still got blocked by Google.

All requests by the superb Windows phone app (according to end-users) to load a YT movie were denied over a conflict where technical and legal arguments were used as distractions from a commercial clash between rival phone operating systems.

The end result: millions of Windows phone users without an official client for YouTube. Never harm end-users over a commercial conflict? Don't do evil?

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/appsblog/2013/aug/15/google-disables-windows-phone-youtube-app (and hundreds of other links)

interview with Eric Schmidt https://medium.com/backchannel/google-motorola-was-a-win-we-couldve-won-with-groupon-wed-never-do-what-amazon-is-doing-a17f27b3aec0 #Tech

 
Posted in Tech Posts | 61 Comments

If skin is sacrosanct why then is foreskin excluded?

Posted on October 6, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

Under most Western laws children can't legally have a tattoo whatever their parents decide but little boys are commonly (33%) circumcised.

If we want to protect children from irreversible damage by the ideas of their parents we should of course just ban religion 😉

Mental damage aside: shouldn't we stop all physical mutilations of children no matter what the underlying idea? Wikipedia reveals that lots of countries (and US states) forbid placing tattoos on minors no matter what their parents think. However these same laws usually allow irreversible male circumcisions.

Why don't we stop genital mutilations regardless of gender and whatever the underlying belief system? Nowadays you can laser a tattoo away, but no word about 3D-printing a missing foreskin.

If skin is sacrosanct why then is foreskin excluded? #Politics

 
Posted in Politics | 66 Comments

Google served malware to millions: are ads really the future of internet?

Posted on September 19, 2014 by MaxHuijgen

Sites like Last.fm, The Times of Israel and The Jerusalem Post who use Google's ad netwok Doubleclick apparently served malware since late August. It's certainly not the first time that an ad network serves malicious code, but it's one of the most high profile occurences.

Worse, the ads were served by Google whose $60 billion business is completely dependent on ad income.

The impact of the malicious code is unclear, but even if estimates of 'just' 5% effectively compromised user systems are correct, these numbers are still way too high.

The risk of allowing ads on your system is basically too high to be acceptable if you care for a stable computer without infections, privacy leaks or other compromises. Ad blockers can and will stop this and are a better first point of defense than virusscanners. So can we still afford to surf the net without an ad blocker?

And the $60 billion Google question: is an internet with automatically served ads viable if people start to defend their systems with ad blockers?

It's not only Google which will hurt from millions of people installing ad blockers, the web pages running these ads lose their business model.

How can the 201x web progress if ads are more dangerous than the downloads of the last decade were. Will we need a new business model?

Background info on the malware: https://blog.malwarebytes.org/malvertising-2/2014/09/large-malvertising-campaign-under-way-involving-doubleclick-and-zedo/ #Tech

 
Posted in Tech Posts | 68 Comments