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Cohesion and disinformation
I guess that by now there is little doubt that the Russian and other governments, such as Iran, are having massively successful (dis)information campaigns on social media, in the countries of Europe and the US, and likely many others too.
Their effectiveness is due to exploiting real existing disagreements in society, magnifying them, and blowing them up way beyond proportion. This ensures that society becomes further split, in fact so far that, amidst a booming economy and record low crime and unemployment rates, the fear of actual civil war and violent unrest is as high as it has not been for a century. The common ground is being eroded, and topics of low impact on the actual day to day life, such as the small number of immigrants to the EU or the tweets of the US president dominate the daily discourse, so that high-impact topics such as climate change or demographic change and their economic consequences are not even on our agenda.
In fact, calling them disinformation campaigns is highly misleading, because they are most effective if they are actually informative and correct. They are most effective if they pick up the real fears (unfounded or not) of real people, and magnify them. This forces the ongoing discourse, and puts the whole society into an ongoing reactive mode. All of us just react, breathlessly, to the latest shocking moment instead of focusing on sustained growth and improvement.
The picture above shows how foreign agents form the cores of the conversation. Note, this is not only on the conservative side, but also, and actually in an even bigger amount, on the progressive side. The researcher who created this picture points out that it felt weird to consider these accounts as equally problematic, because on his side they were resonating with him so much.
That. Is. The. Effing. Point.
Rarely do these agents have an explicit goal. I doubt they are attacking Star Wars because they want to see the movie tank, or because of a direct political goal. Their goal is to increase chaos, weaken coherence, reduce the ability to act. Sometimes the goals are more obvious — for example the operations in Macedonia and Greece, aiming at keeping NATO from growing further — but most of them are not. They might be just aiming at growing discord, or at training people doing this kind of operations.
The people leading these operations are likely of varying intelligence, but all of them will gather years and decades of experience in using social media for manipulation. Also, the operations are cheap and often not even illegal, most often entirely risk free.
We shouldn’t even be surprised about the existence of these operations. The West has used similar methods for decades: emitting radio signals into the communist countries is just the best known. The US is complaining about interference into their elections? Given some operations of the CIA such complaints are almost amusing. The most surprising thing would be if the US or France would *not* have similar operations ongoing. That would be almost negligent.
Why are they doing this? How would I know? My best guess is that from the point of view of Russia or Iran or North Korea the West had accumulated such a large advantage that their most effective bet to ever return to a more level playing field is to drag the West down so hard, to break us into factions, to make us betray our deepest values, with low-cost, no-risk social media operations. What are we gonna do? Impose sanctions because DeplorableJenny37369 made a retweet from a Russian IP address?
Again — this doesn’t mean that they are not real people with valid and different points of views involved. But their concerns are being hijacked, magnified, abused. Read the case studies in the references below to see these mechanisms at work. And this happens on all sides. I am sure I have fallen for these campaigns, just as basically anyone else.
How can we react?
I wish I knew. A few ideas, none of them promising.
Can we all just become more resilient to these operations? Given that these operations are run by highly trained people who dedicate their lives to social media, I guess the chances that we all get collectively smarter and wiser about all of this are not good. You see, I don’t assume that I can beat up an active Marine, so why should I assume that I will constantly outsmart an active intelligence agent.
Technological solutions that detect and shut down such operations? If we expect them to happen voluntarily by the tech companies — I doubt this to happen. I doubt Twitter has the capability or incentive to spent the resources required to counter such measures for something like the Macedonian market. Could regulation compel them? How would that regulation look like? Also, almost all measures will be countered by more sophisticated operations. This is an arms race where the defense is much more expensive than the attack, in many different ways.
Give up some of the level of anonymity we currently enjoy on the Web. I find this approach both terrifying and promising. I am afraid that this is a very high price to pay. I am afraid that this might, if not done with extreme care and massive input from those groups, be potentially most harmful to some of our most vulnerable members in society, such as those who are LGBTQ*, or who suffer from diseases or disabilities, or who are hiding from abusers, and many others. The web’s anonymity has, again and again, been described as the space that allowed them to breathe, to live, to learn how to be themselves. And no matter what the solution is — pseudonymity? asymmetric identity flows? — this has to be preserved. But this is so dangerous, so easy to get wrong. But at the same time there seems a space of potential solutions between the current one and one of full transparency. (Nevermind that for certain actors, such as the NSA, this anonymity is mostly wishful thinking on our parts anyway)
And whereas I believe that a possible solution lives in that space, I am also aware of the horrifying fact that one point in this space is exactly what most of the intervening foreign powers want and are building: a web in which the anonymity of the individual has disappeared. By moving ourselves this way we weaken our own position in the argument against such a controlled web.
What about a solution like SOLID? I am afraid that in fact such a decentralized solution will weaken the technical possibilities to detect and prevent such operations even more. As much as I’m hoping for SOLID to succeed for many different reasons, I’m afraid it might also lead us further into a world of populists and fractured societies.
Just switch Facebook and Twitter off? It will be back, probably faster and more nimble than before.
Factcheckers? As if facts mattered too much in these discussions. Some research shows that showing fact checking results next to false claims increases the appeal of these claims in some cases.
Increase the coherence of society. In my opinion this is the most promising path forward. And the way to do that is to improve everyone’s life and reduce the growing gap between rich and poor. If we reduce the economic stress many people feel, they will be more open to people who are different. If people don’t think that they can barely make it, that they are in desperate need of financial support by the government, they might be more open to the idea to use government funds to help refugees. If they realize that the world is not a zero sum game, they might be more open to change and a fairer representation. The world is getting better and richer. But the returns of these improvements are being handed out very unevenly.
The more cohesion we have, the fewer splits and cracks there already are in society, the smaller the chances of operations succeeding that aim to exploit these cracks and splits.
Which basically means we’re likely screwed, because I don’t see a realistic chance to get there. Also, because the path to this world is being actively blocked by the disinformation campaigns that prompted this text, which has been going on for far too long already. I am sorry for not having a solution, for not even having a good idea of the problem. But there is a problem that needs a solution, a problem that is stubborn and wicked and hard.
And yet, we must. We must. We must.
Reading list:
- The surprising nuance behind the Russian troll strategy (research by Kate Starbird)
- Here’s how Russia runs its disinformation effort (NPR)
- How Twitter bots and Trump fans made #ReleaseTheMemo go viral (Politico)
- Brett Kavanaugh and the information terrorists trying to reshape America (Wired)
- Russian meddling is a symptom, not the disease (NYT op-ed by Zeynep Tufekci)
- How a disastrous change in perspective disempowered the left and let the right rise (The Guardian)
- Media manipulation, strategic amplification, and responsible journalism (essay by danah boyd)
The essay above started life as a Facebook post no November 4, 2018 and received more attentions than my other ramblings. I was asked to put it into a more accessible location, and also to summarize some results from the discussion that ensued. With this Medium post I at least did the former but not the latter. I strongly recommend to take a look at the discussion on the public post.
Thoughts on The Last Jedi
Reading this only makes sense if you have already watched The Last Jedi, and probably the other seven Episodes as well. Given how many surprises and twists have been in Episode VIII, I expect to be completely off, and to be delightfully surprised and entertained when Episode IX appears. For now, here’s my incomplete understanding of watching Episode VIII once and not understanding all of the dialogue. I really should start using subtitles in cinemas.
“You were the Chosen One! You were to bring balance to the Force, not leave it in Darkness.” That is what Obi-Wan yelled at Anakin (back in Episode III). The Chosen One spoken of in the ancient Jedi prophecies — which are probably written down in the exact books that Luke thinks destroyed by Yoda, just before he performs his last sacrifice in order to give the Resistance enough time to flee in the Millenium Falcon. Yoda though already understood the prophecies better than Obi-Wan or Luke, he said that they likely have been misread: the Chosen one was not meant to destroy the Sith.
What does balance mean? The Jedi were basically the top security power of the Republic, the prime power next to the Senate. The Sith? Just a legend, and even in legend there were only two of them at a time, forced into hiding by the powerful Jedi. If the Chosen One was promised to bring balance between the Jedi and the Sith, the near destruction of the Jedi is indeed the most effective step to reach that goal — something Yoda seemed to have known.
From the middle of Episode III to VI, both Sith and Jedi were in a similarly precarious situation, both sides locked in existential fights. When Luke trained Kylo and the other young Jedi, he was starting to tip the balance again to one side. The fateful night when Luke was contemplating killing his own nephew in his sleep, when Kylo turned to the Dark Side, the balance shifted, and a champion for the Light Side was needed — enter Rey in Episode VII. Snoke himself said that Rey only came in in order to balance Kylo. Does he realize that the goal of either of the sides winning must be doomed if the Force — the all powerful Force! — will always plot to overturn any victory, will always counter any time any side starts winning, even if it means to create beings as powerful as Vader or Rey?
The lesson of Episode VIII — the message of the movie, not just within Star Wars, but also for everyone’s life — is about the importance of failure, how effective failure is as a teacher, as long as one is resilient enough to use it as a lesson. And indeed, the film is full of failures, so full of failures one might question half of the plotlines because they don’t lead to any pay off. Poe fails to stay loyal, starts a rebellion on the fleeing Resistance ship because of Vice-Admiral Holdo’s failure as a leader to communicate her plan. Finn’s failure to bring the beacon to lead Rey back into a safe space gets him into a crazy plan to shake off the First Order. Finn and Rose’s quest to find the Codebreaker, and then to switch off the tracker, failed miserably on the last second, and made that whole storyline look so futile. Luke’s failure to train and raise Kylo. Or Rey. Leia’s failure to keep the Resistance safe. Rey’s failure to bring Luke with her to the Resistance. Rey’s failure to attack Snoke. Rey’s failure to turn Kylo to the Light. Kylo’s failure to convince Rey to join him in creating a new order. Kylo’s constant failures in Snoke’s eyes. The film is full of failures, and these almost entirely annihilate the Resistance, and indeed Leia’s legacy of ending the Empire and creating the New Republic, a Republic spanning the whole galaxy. At the end of the movie the active part of the Resistance fits inside the Millenium Falcon.
These failures, once processed by the numerous protagonists of the movie, can lead to a great pay off in Episode IX. Destiny — and the Force — have probably taught our protagonists exactly the lessons they need in order to be in place to finally fulfill the prophecy and bring balance to the Force. Poe already showed a little of that new found wisdom, as acknowledged by Leia in her beautiful handoff — “What are you looking at me for? Follow him!”
How could that look like? An end to both Sith and Jedi, an end to the dichotomy of the Light and Dark Side of the Force? Well, that’s certainly one way to have balance, both being at zero. But that’s where the boy with the broom comes in. The Force remains present, even if the Skywalkers end their little family feud (and there are not that many Skywalkers left anyway). Will Rey and Kylo find their own new ways to a new world? To a new balance? Maybe one where balance is not defined by which order is stronger, by whether the Jedi or the Sith rule the galaxy, but by a balance in each and every force wielder themselves?
Luke said that he saw the Dark Side in Kylo, but it was clear that this was his own perception. Kylo was very strong, and Luke always was suppressing his Dark Side very much, so the Dark Side in Kylo, even if it were much weaker than his Light Side, would have certainly looked frightening to Luke. If you ask Kylo it was Luke who triggered the Dark Side in himself by, well, trying to murder him. But Luke also saw how reckless Rey was with regards to the Dark Side. Rey went to the Pond of the Dark Side, and seems to have left it untainted. What if the Dark Side and the Light Side are, indeed, just sides of the same Force? If that division is meaningless to the Force but an invention of the Sith and Jedi? If they were not meant to be separated inside individuals, but kept at balance within?
Did you notice the Jedi symbol in the fountain in Anch-To? It was half black, half white, not the representation of the symbol I usually remember. Was there a long lost time where the balance was already achieved?
Balance does not have to be at a near zero level. But the story of the galaxy as told in the saga is a story of millions of deaths, of planets and stars destroyed, of entire fleets annihilated, and in the end it will always be without effect, because the Force will always overturn any victory. Either we have to achieve a new synthesis of Dark and Light, and find a new way to balance the powers — no matter how it looks like — or we have to continue the circles of destruction, which was quite deliberately started anew with Episode VII mirroring so much of Episode IV, and the star wars will keep going on and on.
P.S.: Now you may ask what if the balance is restored, does this mean an end to Star Wars? And even for that this movie offers the answer, by the peak into the world of Canto, where we see that even without a mythological Force that splits the world in Dark and Light, the world offers enough shades of gray to generate conflicts and interesting stories into all eternity.
- This post was first published on Medium on December 18, 2017
Updating Simia
The last few days, the Website was going really slow again. And I was preparing for a frustrating fight with Bitnami, Google Cloud, and whatever else to figure things out.
I have to admit that this is not what happened. Google Cloud has a Gemini-powered Cloud Assist chatbot. And I just asked it what to do. The suggestions sounded reasonable, and it wrote down the exact commands. A few times I came to an error, but just copy-pasting it to the assistant, it quickly found out what to do instead, and, well, it seemed to have worked. The site is now up and running, and for the last half an hour or so, CPU utilisation has dropped dramatically. Cloud Assist predicted a drop from 100% utilisation to 5%, so far I can see 40%, but hey, that's a great start. I can actually read my own entries again!
Then I went a step further, to resolve a long-standing issue: the page did not have https yet. What was OK 25 years ago, when it launched, has long been something that browsers really loudly complain about. Rightfully.
Again, it was a question to cloud assist, and it took me through the steps.
All of the steps I did today, none of them were hard. It was, in fact, embarrassingly easy. It was just configuring tools that already were downloaded and existed and downloading and running one tool.
Well then, that's a win, for me and for AI! Thanks Google Cloud Assist!
The Odyssey 2026
I mean, it's Nolan. It's a great movie. He knows how to make movies. So the three hours pass like a breeze and are enjoyable. The cast is great, I particularly enjoyed Matt Damon, Robert Pattinson and Samantha Morton as Circe.
Agamemnon was absolutely breathtaking. He stole every scene he was in. (Until he started talking. I didn't like his voice. But those looks!)
The first half hour or so of the movie felt like an extended trailer. Which is very Nolan, but surprising and a little unsettling given the familiar setting and story. It gets more settled and classical later on.
I really disliked the body horror scenes around Circe. And the design of the monsters was... unsatisfying. Polyphem? Ok. Unusual and new. But then Scylla with the same beige color and skin-like texture? It looked like Ray Harryhausen. Which was fine in his time, but underwhelming in a 2026 AAA title. But it did give me a genuine jump scare.
I found the whole movie lacking color saturation. I have to compare it to 2004 Troy, which I find much more appealing as a Greek mythology saga movie. The Odyssey is a 2026 movie, binding it to our time in subtle ways, on the expense of the timelessness that Troy has.
(Spoilers in this paragraph) But what I really enjoyed was the novel twist to the plot, that I haven't seen before. That it was Odysseus who broke the old contract that was keeping society together. That this was the reason for the long way home. In a way this was the same core plot point as Oppenheimer. And possibly an important lesson for our age. That gave food for thought. But almost like a memory of the thoughts that Oppenheimer provoked. But I enjoyed these ideas explored in such a familiar setting.
Now that I spilled out my thoughts, let's see what others have written. And again, it's a great movie. Worth watching.
Croatia's goal was stolen! Portugal is scripted to advance
The feed for my Facebook reels is now full of videos analyzing the Croatian goal that wasn't counted, and with conspiracy theories about the whole World Cup being scripted for a Ronaldo-Messi finale.
And this is how easily social media radicalizes you. I have no idea how widespread either of these ideas are. Is there really a dominating public debate happening about this? I don't think so. But for me, looking at my Facebook reels, it would appear like this is the most important thing happening right now. And look at all these people making smart videos agreeing with me! And not a single one disagreeing!
I'm confirmed in my bias. Look, everyone thinks that the VAR was wrong. Everyone thinks Croatia was robbed of a chance to continue to compete. And yet nothing is happening.
I have two ways I can react: first, I could try to do something. Protest. Demand reform. Make petitions. Get involved with the relevant governing bodies and make changes. Obviously I don't care nearly enough to put in that energy and change the priorities in my life for that. And as I do that, I would actually feel the resistance in real life, notice how little support that idea actually may have. A reality check
The second way: I engage with these videos, write supporting comments, strengthen this belief and get sucked in by tapping on a screen, get more cynical about the world because although everyone believes the same as I do, nothing is changing, so it must be “them” who keep the real control and decide differently. My trust in institutions further erodes, seeing the obvious discrepancy between what everybody believes and between what actually happens.
The bubble wrap around me gets tighter, splintering society further. Shared spaces starve, because folks prefer the comforts of confirmation over confronting conflict. I mean, why even try to reach across the aisle if my tribe is so big? If we are the obvious majority?
And the designers behind the social media feed algorithms either know all of this and still pursue it, intentionally, because of the monetary advantages it brings, or they have given up on caring and handed the decisions over to an algorithm whose goal is engagement. The algorithm is unaware of any cost not modeled in its objective function. Like a paperclip maximizer, it is set up to maximize engagement or whatever the metric is, even if it breaks society. That would be either an externalized cost, or not relevant for this quarter’s metrics, or just invisible.
This isn’t about the Croatia game. This is about how we process crises and deal with controversies, from COVID and the January 6 insurrection to elections and institutional trust. It is about vaccines and raw milk, the support for Ukraine, the rise of authoritarianism, our response to climate change. This is about how our society is breaking.
Why do we allow social media algorithms to tear our social fabric apart? Is this just another complaint to feed my own bubble, getting confirmation from others, but not do anything about? What about you, will you just agree and move on? Or are we willing to put in the work and make a change?
Flower power
One of the most shocking movie scenes that burnt into my mind was in the opening credits of the 2009 Watchmen movie, directed by Zack Snyder. 50,000 protesters took part in the March on the Pentagon in 1967. A row of military police was pointing their rifles at the protesters. A flower power protester puts a flower into the barrel of one of the rifles. In the movie, Bob Dylan's The Times They are A-Changing is playing over the scene, recreating an iconic photograph from 1967. (link in comment)
But in the alternative reality of the movie, the police fires at the protesters.
I remember seeing that scene in the movie theater, and I found that image absolutely distressing, thinking about the terrible alternate reality that would have been. How many people would have died, how different the United States would be today... and being glad that reality took a different turn.
... but did it?
Today I learned about the 1967 Detroit riots. More than 7000 people arrested, 43 people killed, of which 30 were killed by the authorities and another six by store owners or security guards. It was in the same year. And the authorities were shooting and killing the people, mostly black people. But that seems a lot like the terrible "alternative reality" Snyder's movie was drawing. But it was not an alternate reality. It was just not the story of mostly white hippies on the coasts, but of mostly black people in Detroit.
I am ashamed it took me until today to have learned about these events. But one thing I can do is reading more about the events and maybe reach others who might not have known.
- Flower Power photograph - Wikipedia
- 1967 March on the Pentagon - Wikipedia
- Intro scene from Watchmen
- 1967 Detroit riot
Mega-IPOs
There are more than 15 trillion (!) dollar invested in index funds. Starting in a few days and going on until the fall of next year, more than half a trillion dollar of that money will be pulled out from the existing company shares in numerous indexes and used to buy SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic shares from their existing share owners. (Most of it will start happening in about a year, when the S&P500 lets SpaceX join. Unlike NASDAQ, S&P didn't change their rules to fast-track these mega IPOs. But they will join NASDAQ before their first quarterly report as a public company).
With the IPOs of SpaceX (this Friday), OpenAI, and Anthropic, and them joining NASDAQ and FTSE's global index within a few days after their IPOs (and S&P and Dow Jones a year later), everyone who has invested in index funds, be it directly through ETFs or indirectly through their 401k and other retirement plans, will automatically sell about 5% of the shares they are currently holding, and buy shares from one of these three companies. All three IPOs will be, by far!, the largest IPOs in history.
So, if you have $100 invested in a NASDAQ-indexed ETF, you will be selling $5 of the stocks you currently own (while everyone else is doing the same) and buy $5 worth of Anthropic, SpaceX and OpenAI stocks (while everyone else is doing the same), automatically and predictably.
It will be a tough time for the rest of the stock market this year, as there will be a lot of people's money flowing to OpenAI, SpaceX and Antrhopic without anyone ever intentionally buying it, with the market sending 5% of its liquidity to these three new mega IPOs. It will be immensely beneficial for everyone selling these shares.
Whether it will be beneficial for the general public, i.e. for the people holding these index funds, is something we are going to see in the next few years. I wouldn't wager a prediction on that. Maybe there's an AI bubble that might burst, maybe making more of their numbers public will make some people think they are overvalued, maybe all three companies will realise incredible value and will lift the stock indexes well beyond the 5% of the market they will initially cost. We are going to see. If I could make predicitons about how these things will develop, I'd be much richer.
But it seems that in the next 12-18 months, 100s of billions of dollars are slated to go from retirement plans and other stock investors to Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and others. Happy to discuss if I misunderstand.
The Amazing Digital Circus
(spoiler free)
The Amazing Digital Circus is an animation show of which, until about a month ago, I haven't even heard about. I learned about it from my daughter. It is the work of an independent creator, and was initially published on YouTube and later also made available on Netflix. The YouTube video of the first episode has more than 400 million views and on Netflix it's been in the top ten for a while.
The premise is that a few humans are captured in a virtual reality, where an AI has the job to entertain them. With time we realize that some of the humans have been there for decades, one has partially lost his mind, and there seems to be no way out. The colorful graphics and seemingly silly character designs hide a much darker story, inspired by "The Matrix", maybe "Lost", and "I have no mouth but I must scream".
The show has nine episodes, each about half an hour long and the final episode double that, so not too long.
I find the animation style somewhat subpar, but the pacing is so much more comfortable and relaxed than many other current shows and movies. The characters are really well done, and feel realistic and multifaceted.
The last episode is currently being shown in cinemas, and it seems do be doing extremely well for an independent show, before it will be available on YouTube in a few days (for free, like the rest of the show). We went to watch it today, and very much enjoyed it.
Given how Lost didn't manage to find a fully satisfying ending, and The Matrix had trouble with storytelling after the first movie, I didn't expect that the Amazing Digital Circus would be able to bring the story to a satisfying end.
I was wrong.
The ending was so much better than I expected it to be. It was fresh and novel (well, there's probably some manga or SF short story with that storyline, but it was novel to me) and more satisfying than I would have deemed possible in such a short episode. Not every question seemed answered, but with this show I expect not to have picked up on every clue and I'll probably find more answers in a few weeks. But the big ones were, and the story came to a close.
Can recommend.
Marjane Satrapi
Marjane Satrapi, the brave and talented creator of the wonderful and honest graphic novel Persepolis, has died. Her magnum opus is an autobiography, telling of her young years growing up during the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Iran-Iraq war of 1980, and then moving to Austria, for safety and to study. But Vienna isn't the safe space her family was hoping for, she's having a difficult time, and returns to Iran. The difference between the two worlds really show. Back home, she can't find her place either.
It's not an easy book to read, it is nuanced, it feels sincere, and it shines a very human light on what the revolution meant, on what emigration can be like.
It was a popular graphic novel, pushing what was usually done with the medium. Satrapi was one of the first women to find success with graphic novels.
According to her family, Satrapi died at the age of 56 of a broken heart, following her husband's death last year.
I very much recommend reading the book. It is not an easy story, but it is an important one.
The Future of Truth
What a mind boggling and raw article by Wired: Steve Rosenbaum has a book out, "The Future of Truth", on the effect of AI chatbots on the understanding of truth. Rosenbaum has a master's degree in "truth" from New York University (what does that even mean?) and has decades of experience in this field: creating news programs for MTV and reporting on the aftermath of 9/11 in New York and much more.
But the New York Times reported that Rosenbaum's book is heavily relying on AI, for example containing made up quotes. Wired had previously published an excerpt from the book, but given its strict no AI policy for content and the reporting by the Times, it pulled the excerpt.
Instead, Wired interviewed Rosenbaum. Here's one quote:
"I do not understand why it's my job as an author to play whack-a-mole with a multibillion-dollar company who puts hallucinations into their feed as a business practice”
Because it's your book! It's your name on the cover. This text is your responsibility.
And he's not alone:
“I talked to another author this morning who's literally got a book coming out going to the publisher in a month, and she's fucking terrified.” I asked if that was because she used AI in the process of writing the book. “Of course"
There's a silver lining:
"I asked him whether he would rather stop writing than stop using AI in his writing process. “Yeah,” he answered."
That's a good idea. I sure have little interest to read anything from a person with this attitude.
