Zag To The Zig :: Issue #7
Apparently, readers forget who is actually behind all the newsletters they subscribe to. So little reminder, hello! š Iām Gerrie Smits. šAs a CCO (Chief Curiosity Officer), I try to make sense of the impact of tech. Words I use (too) often are āblockchainā and āuserā. And that is why I curate Zag To The Zig. Thank you.
This week, in the Economy RoomĀ
The battle for digital currencies world domination continues. And I wish my blockchain book was available in Mandarin. Because after China's president XI publicly said āBlockchains are good. We should all focus on blockchains.ā, Baidu searches for āblockchainā went up by almost 1400%. Plus, the Communist Party launched an online course on blockchain. šµ
At the same time, coins from Chinese blockchains like NEO, NULS and ONT shot up like a rocket looking for Da Moon. š
photo: Nathaniel Whittemore
Subscription models are all the rage, but arenāt so easy to copy-paste. This interesting advice from former Spotifyās chief economist to the book publishing industry is worth a read. āWhat happens when nothing is consumed? Itās an inconvenient truth that an awful lot of books are purchased but not read.ā
Ironically, the piece is available on one of those PDF-readers.
In the Tech room
If Apple can do it, we can do it too. How mobile phones for criminals are big business. Dark.
Some sc-fi stuff, seemingly getting real. Japanese start-up Empath claims to have an AI that can identify emotions based on your voice. Apparently, itās already been used in call centres and children toys.
More mind-bending AI. Researchers in Chicago have created a computer model that allows fully paralyzed people to just *imagine* moving their arm to write a letter. The neural network translates the brain waves to a letter, et voila.
The ethics/fairness roomĀ
Wow. The BBC has taken quite a step to make its international news website more censorship-resistant. Countries like Iran, Vietnam, China,ā¦ have tried to block access but now the Beeb is hosting a version of their website for users of the Tor-browser.
In the left-hand corner, the platform. In the right-hand corner, the creators creating value. Meet FairTube, a campaign from a YouTubers Union (?) and a MetalWorkers Union (??) to demand fairness and more transparency over algorithms, ranking videos,ā¦ Weird combination, but weāll see more of this, I think.
Random ZTTZ
Not sure whether to laugh or to cry at this. Googleās Special Projects team makes Paper Phone, an app that prints out your crucial information, in order to use your phone less. Quote: āit helps you do things in a more focused wayā. No, really?
šĀ End note: 1 thing Iāll be doing this weekā¦
Nerd alert! Iām helping AVADO (friends of ZTTZ) with some onboarding and UX advice for their decentralised hardware server. Which means Iāll be installing (or trying to) an Ethereum node and a decentralised VPN app which is meant to pay the router aka me for bandwidth. Incentivisation FTW.