Factualities for November 7, 2018
November 7, 2018
Believe ‘em or not.
- 900 percent. Amount Facebook inflated its ad watching data. Source: Slashdot
- $390 billion. Size of the global cyber weapon market in 2014. Estimated growth rate: 4.4 percent. Source; Transparency Market Research
- 66 percent. Calculated segment of the US population which has
heard about software robots. Source: Pew - $1 billion. The amount Massachusetts Institute of Technology will spend for its Schwarzman College of Computing which will focus on artificial intelligence. Source: Digital Trends
- 2019. When Jeff Bezos will send tourists into space. Source: Recode
- $45 billion. Amount invested in Softbank’s Vision Fund. Source: Quartz
Stephen E Arnold, November 7, 2018
Factualities for October 31, 2018
October 31, 2018
Believe ‘em or not. More satisfying, symmetric numbers from assorted data mavens:
- 50 percent. The volume of government censor requests for censoring YouTube content.
Source: Inquisitr - 800. Number of spam accounts Facebook purged. Source: SFGate
- Zero. The number of times Google mentioned its Android operating system during its Made by Google 2018 keynote. Source: 9to5Google
- 40,000. Number of facial recognition cameras monitoring 11 million uighurs in China. Source: Business Insider
- 30 million. Number of DuckDuckGo searches delivered on one day in October 2018. By comparison, Google delivered only 3.5 billion daily searches. Source: Slashgear
- 111 million active profiles on Google Plus in 2015. (This number will soon be zero because consumer Google Plus has been killed off by lax security and possibly interesting management methods.) For a point of reference, Facebook has two billion active profiles or 18 times the traction of Google Plus. Source: CNet
Stephen E Arnold, October 31, 2018
Factualities for October 24, 2018
October 24, 2018
Believe ‘em or not, especially the nice, round, chubby numbers:
- 33 percent of US adults hit with identity theft. Source: DarkReading
- 45 out of 50 companies illegally void warranties for electronics. Source: Reddit.com
- 000000. Kanye West’s iPhone pass code. Graham Cluley
- $50,000 per hour. Cost of Flying the F 35 fighter aircraft for one hour.
Source: New York Times page A 19 October 12, 2018 - 29 million people. Number of individuals probably affected by the September Facebook breach. Source: Facebook
- 30 000. Number of US Department of Defense personnel records which may have been breached by hackers. Source: Cyberscoop
Stephen E Arnold, October 24, 2018
Factualities for October 17, 2018
October 17, 2018
Hey, hey, believe ‘em or not.
- 33 percent of US adults hit with identity theft. Source: DarkReading
- 45 out of 50 companies illegally void warranties for electronics. Source: Reddit.com
- 000000. Kanye West’s iPhone pass code. Source: Graham Cluley
- $50,000 per hour. Cost of Flying the F 35 fighter aircraft for one hour. Source: New York Times page A 19 October 12, 2018
- 29 million people. Number of individuals probably affected by the September Facebook breach. Source: Facebook
- 30 000. Number of US Department of Defense personnel records which may have been breached by hackers. Source: Cyberscoop
Beyond Search loves round numbers. So satisfyingly accurate-like.
Stephen E Arnold, October 17, 2018
Factualities for September 26, 2018
September 26, 2018
Believe ‘em or not:
- 58 million. The number of new jobs artificial intelligence will create by 2022. Source: Forbes
- 183.9. The top speed a woman reached riding a bicycle. Source: National Public Radio
- 55 percent of millennials prefer learning via YouTube. 59 percent of Generation Z prefer learning via YouTube. Source: Axios
- 71 percent. The percentage of startups in Israel focusing on business to business applications based on artificial intelligence. Source: Forbes
- 557,000. Number of backlogged US security clearances in the last 90 days. Source: FAS.org
- $783. Average monthly p9ayment of an Uber or Yelp driver in 2017. Source: Technology Review
- 2.0 billion euros. Amount raised by startups in France in the first six months of 2018. Amount raised in same period in 2017: 2.6 billion euros. Source: Bloomberg
- Everyone. The number of people Twitter will ask about its policy changes. Techcrunch.
Yep, numbers one can trust. Like “everyone.”
Stephen E Arnold, September 26, 2018
Factualities for Wednesday, August 15, 2018
August 15, 2018
Believe these items or not. We found them interesting:
- China has built 350000 5G cell sites; the US, 30 000
Source: CNBC - Five billion videos are watched around the world each day, with the vast majority of viewers being between 18 and 49-years-old. Source: Express tabloid newspaper
- Americans are now spending 11 hours each day consuming media. Source: Quartz
- Criminal activities account for just 10 percent of Bitcoin transactions. DEA via CCN.com
- Google will lose $50 million or more in 2018 from Fortnite bypassing the Play Store. Source: Techcrunch
- Baltimore will pay a person $176,800 to maintain Lotus Notes. Source: Baltimore Sun newspaper
Real or fake? A question smart software will have to answer. We cannot.
Stephen E Arnold, August 15, 2018
Facebook Versus YouTube: Understanding 13 to 17 Year olds
June 1, 2018
I read “Teens Have Abandoned Facebook”. The source is the Daily Mail, and I believe everything I read in the British tabloid. What caught my attention was the big usage gap, if the data are accurate. A couple of highlights:
- In 2014, more than 70 percent of those 13 to 17 used Facebook. Today that usage figure is 51 percent. (Like most surveys, the nuts and bolts of the method are not provided.)
- Also, teens in the sample voted with their eyeballs. More than 80 percent use Alphabet Google’s YouTube.
- Finally, I learned that more than 90 percent of the 13 to 17 crowd own or have access to a smartphone, not a plain vanilla cheapo device. A smartphone.
The source of the data is the Pew outfit. Since I am not too interested in teenagers and their “usage patterns,” check out the write up.
Stephen E Arnold, June 1, 2018
More Poll Excitement: Information Overload
January 5, 2017
I read “Really? Most Americans Don’t Suffer Information Overload.” The main idea is that folks in the know, in the swim, and in the top one percent suffer from too much information. The rest of the ignorance-is-bliss crowd has a different perception.
The write up explains, reports, states:
A new report from the Pew Research Center says that most Americans do not suffer from information overload—even though many of us frequently say otherwise.
What’s up with that?
The write up points out:
Many people complain about the volume of information coming at us. But we want it. Adweek reported earlier this year that the average person consumes almost 11 hours of media per day. That’s everything from text messages to TV programs to reading a newspaper.
Well, the Pew outfit interviewed 1,520 people which is sample approved by those who look in the back of statistics 101 textbooks rely upon. I have no details about the demographics of the sample, geographic location, and reason these folks took time out from watching Netflix to answer the Pew questions, however.
The answer that lots of people don’t suffer from information overload seems wrong when viewed from the perspective of a millennial struggling to buy a house while working as a customer support rep until the automated system is installed.
But wait. The write up informs me:
the recent national election showed that “in a lot of ways people live in small information bubbles. They get information on social media that has been filtered for them. It is filtered by the network they belong to. In a lot of ways, there’s less information and much of it is less diverse than it was in an earlier era.” The public’s hunger for that information is reflected in a study conducted by Bank of America. The bank found that 71 percent of the people they surveyed sleep within arm’s reach of their smartphone. And 3 percent of those people hold their smartphone while they’re in dreamland.
Too much information for me.
Stephen E Arnold, January 5, 2017
Nobody Really Knows What Goes on over Dark Web
December 16, 2016
While the mainstream media believes that the Dark Web is full of dark actors, research by digital security firms says that most content is legal. It only says one thing; the Dark Web is still a mystery.
The SC Magazine in an article titled Technology Helping Malicious Business on the Dark Web Grow says:
The Dark Web has long had an ominous appeal to Netizens with more illicit leanings and interests. But given a broadening reach and new technologies to access this part of the web and obfuscate dealings here, the base of dark web buyers and sellers is likely growing.
On the other hand, the article also says:
But despite its obvious and well-earned reputation for its more sinister side, at least one researcher says that as the dark web expands, the majority of what’s there is actually legal. In its recent study, intelligence firm Terbium Labs found that nearly 55 percent of all the content on the dark web is legal in nature, meaning that it may be legal pornography, or controversial discussions, but it’s not explicitly illegal by U.S. law.
The truth might be entirely different. The Open Web is equally utilized by criminals for carrying out their illegal activities. The Dark Web, accessible only through Tor Browser allows anyone to surf the web anonymously. We may never fully know if the Dark Web is the mainstay of criminals or of individuals who want to do their work under the cloak of anonymity. Till then, it’s just a guessing game.
Vishal Ingole, December 16, 2016
A Crisis of Confidence
December 14, 2016
I remember a time, long ago, when my family was confident that newspapers and TV reporters were telling us most of the objective facts most of the time. We also had faith that, though flawed human beings, most representatives in Congress were honestly working hard for (what they saw as) positive change. Such confidence, it seems, has gone the way of pet rocks and parachute pants. The Washington Examiner reports, “Fishwrap: Confidence in Newspapers, TV News Hits Bottom.” The brief write-up gives the highlights of a recent Gallup survey. Writer Paul Bedard tells us:
Gallup found that just 20 percent have confidence in newspapers, a 10-point drop in 10 years. TV news saw an identical 10-point drop, from 31 percent to 21 percent. But it could be worse. Of all the institutions Gallup surveyed on, Congress is at the bottom, with just 9 percent having confidence in America’s elected leaders, a finding that is clearly impacting the direction and tone of the 2016 elections. And Americans aren’t putting their faith in religion. Gallup found that confidence in organized religion dropped below 50 percent, to an all-time low of 41 percent.
Last decade’s financial crisis, the brunt of which many are still feeling, has prompted us to also lose faith in our banks (confidence dropped from 49 percent in 2006 to just 27 percent this year). There is one institution in which Americans still place our confidence—the military. Some 73 percent of are confident of that institution, a level that has been constant over the last decade. Could that have anything to do with the outsized share of tax revenue that segment consistently rakes in? Nah, that can’t be it.
Cynthia Murrell, December 14, 2016
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