Word-whore. I write 'em. I talk 'em. Information, politics, media, and the cybers. I drink. I use bad words. All publication is a political act. All communication is propaganda. All art is pornography. All business is personal. All hail Eris! Vive les poissons rouges sauvages!
My week of Monday 2 to Sunday 8 September 2019 was another one where there was little productive to show you, Gentle Reader, but that was the plan. Adelaide and Bangkok were wonderful changes of scenery, as it were.
Continue reading “Weekly Wrap 484: Nostalgia in Adelaide and Bangkok”
My week of Monday 26 August to Sunday 1 September 2019 was full of distractions, pleasant and otherwise. It included some much-needed relaxation after the stresses of recent weeks.
Continue reading “Weekly Wrap 483: De-stressing in Manly, Adelaide, and Willunga”
My week of Monday 19 to Sunday 25 December 2016 was one of my more unusual weeks in 2016, and that’s saying something.
I mentioned last week that I planned to be in Adelaide, my home town, on Monday to Wednesday for a family funeral on Tuesday. What I didn’t mention was that my mother was the deceased. We were no longer close, so it felt more like a family duty than an emotional rollercoaster, but visiting your home town after a gap of more than 12 years is always… interesting.
And soon it was Christmas, and soon less than a week remained until 2017. Whose idea was this again?
None.
Monday and Tuesday are meant to be public holidays, but I’m working through. Monday is about tiding up a few loose ends. Then for the rest of the week it’s a bunch of work on the SEKRIT editorial project, and writing for ZDNet.
There will also be an episode of The 9pm Edict podcast recorded on Wednesday 28 December at 2100 AEST. It’ll be streamed live from stilgherrian.com/edict/live/.
Update 27 December 2016: No, let’s do this podcast in the first week of January.
I’m already scheduling events for 2017. It seems I’ll be covering the RSA Information Security Conference in San Francisco on 13 to 16 February, and the APRICOT 2017 / APNIC43 conference in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, at the end of February and into early March. Stay tuned.
[Photo: Exeter Hotel, Rundle Street, Adelaide, photographed on 19 December 2016.]
I’ve already hinted at the importance of Heartbleed, the internet security bug, to my working week. Oh, and to the internet, yeah, that too. Well, my first media object was an article for Crikey. The second was this conversation on Adelaide commercial radio station 1395 FIVEaa.
Even though a lot more has been learned about Heartbleed since this conversation took place, and I’ve written a bunch of stuff for ZDNet Australia after each of the daily briefings by the SANS Institute’s Internet Storm Centre (ISC), which will be listed in the Weekly Wrap, this conversation with Will Goodings from Wednesday afternoon stands up surprisingly well.
I think.
Judge for yourself.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 10:26 — 4.3MB)
The audio is ©2014 dmgRadio Australia, but here it is ‘cos it hasn’t been posted on the radio station’s website. Besides, this is a reasonable plug, and they sent the audio file to me knowing this is exactly what I was going to be doing with it.
Earlier this morning I spoke about Facebook’s disturbing new “Big Cat” technology on ABC 702 Sydney, and here’s the audio.
Big Cat is the codename for an algorithm that can apparently detect with a high reliability whether your partner is having an extramarital affair, by analysing such things as their pattern of friend formation and communication, comparing their smartphone location with what they’ve said in posts — such as whether they’re really shopping or at the gym or on a work trip — as well as language cues, such as a tendency to avoid answering direct questions.
In a way, it’s a natural extension of MIT research from 2009, which showed that a young man’s pattern of friend formation could reveal whether he was gay — often before he even knew himself. Or Target (US) being able to determine when a woman had become pregnant from her shopping list — at least with 87% accuracy.
It’s the kind of stuff I talk about in my guest lecture to UTS students — which, as it happens, I’ll be updating and presenting this coming Monday 7 April.
As I discuss with breakfast presenter Robbie Buck, however, this is a little more serious than sending someone some discount coupons on a likely hunch. Facebook had better get this right, given that confronting a partner about an alleged affair is a serious issue.
I’m hearing that the Australia test locations will be the Brisbane / Gold Coast nexus or, more likely, Adelaide, for reasons that I explain.
One thing we forgot to mention in the interview is the reason for Facebook’s codename: “Big Cat” is for catching cheaters. Oh dear.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:03 — 4.1MB)
The audio is of course ©2014 Australian Broadcasting Corporation.