Innovation, economics, society at large – Page 29

Log not Log

About the resurgence of ‘logging’ as a thing.
In compliance, for whatever reason because everyone lost the Original purpose.
In ‘audit’ (like, checking bookkeeping — no you drop the pretense and lies that’s all there is to it!), since we (??) can now do den totalen Prozesskontrolle.
In systems management, to …:

Monitor the health of systems — note that a lot of logging will be superfluous for this purpose (lest the next bullet comes into play), and a lot of the other records will be processed near-completely-automated into nice dashboards; note also that in this environment, that seems to work whereas in enviroments where ‘dashboards’ have been promoted for ages (decades, mind you) without any success, with the cause already known just as long;
Detect/find, and process, intrusions. Being proxies for ‘fraud’ (quod non, and note that legally, there’s no such thing!) to be committed.

Most efforts of late go into the latter thing (apart from the good work (sic) done by, e.g., the Coney‘s of this world). Where we see a jump to the worst, most atrocious, of Big Brother privacy obliteration by processing each and every little in-systems program step that can be logged, traced. Even by, what could have been, proper all-out systems management integrating the traditional style of it, with IoT device management, as e.g., Splunk now is focusing on whilst leaving their core competence behind.
Missing the point that ‘systems management’ over all transactions having started with the human ones, was the Original purpose. To monitor (at the speed of annual bookkeeping ..!) the health of ‘systems’, the business as performed and understand that not all transactions could be perfectly in line with the, unthinkingly overstandardised ideal transaction patterns.

Can we now, now that we do have the mechanics (log writing speed, all-connectivity, and storage (!) and processing tools available) regain that latter part..?
Hopefully.

And:

[Modern (purpose), still also a sun dial; Barça]

Quitting a club

Where some trade association of … drum roll … chartered (sic) IS auditors declared Cybersecurity is becoming an ever bigger problem. An IS auditor should need to keep informed of the latest developments as an argument to join in some CYBER ARRGHHH! lecture,
one better leaves. I did.

Sure, I’m member of some other, global, of the same trade and tricks one might say. But to list the other arguments to quit the local (i.e., Dutch; could have characterised them as ‘provincial’ but why) one, would take ten pages (yes I have them, spelled out including various legal trespassing of the vilest kind, far from complete after some this-years developments within the club…) and I don’t want to bother you with the water under the bridge.
And sure, I re-joined yet another trade association. And try to contribute in another way, as yet not yet disclosed. And #ditchcyber.

But I’m unsure about my discretion in leaving (behind the hopeless) and would be curious about your best advice when and how (that’s two) to quit a club. Thoughts?

Oh:

[Not only T towers might need (sic) to be renamed…]

Plusquote: LogiC PA

Be ware, dear people. Recently, an accountant, of the CPA type, came with the following quote:

The partner model isn’t part of the problem with our industry sector, because look at banks; they left the partner model ages ago and still got into trouble recently.”

To think that such ‘logic’ considers themselves competent to even come within miles’ range of anything to do with money, let alone approving designed-for-hypercomplexity (with the hubris element in hyper) bookkeeping — as unfathomable complex as the finance sector had concocted by the quants, theoretical physicists that were experts in completely-outside-of-human-reality math … but hey, they hadn’t a partner model to shield them from reality …

Typical of the thing that brought POTUS-elect into Office. And the proper response here of course is to laugh in their face for their stupidity; so many (all?) religions and not-religions have the eternity of afterlife where the above will be punished to no end. Lost their soul, can’t be helped.

Oh well:

[Re-using an old one, and recalling a Clan song; from Porto’s Casa de Musica of course]

Sticky Wicked

I’ve been seeing ‘wicked problem’ turn up again lately. Again, hardly in its original sense let alone to the criteria. But rather, as problems where the counterforces to solutions are just too dug in against change, to be overcome. As human, societal problems rather than something systemically hard. To bulldozer over, with a MBT, maybe ..? What a fine demonstration of irritation to let loose.

And, of course:

WindTalker

Right. So we have a side channel attack where your hand movements over your mobile, when typing in your key, will interfere with WiFi signal patterns in a detectable, traceable way thus revealing your key. Like this (PDF).
Would this, on a second trend note, destroy or obviate even more the need for, Active Access Control ..?

Plus:

[Mock-up for fabrics not mockery of your security; Stedelijk Amsterdam]

Misquote: No Problem, or are you?

Don’t come to me with problems, only with solutions

Is wrong in so many ways…

When not if a manager would say such a thing, he denies his (her, not often enough) very job. Yes, the job of a manager in times of knowledge workers truly is what it was in times past, glorious as they were; “decision making under uncertainty”. Which has devolved into sickly-panic over any uncertainty that is inherent in results as future states;
So, workers — sounds too much like worker bees, working to their untimely death for the blip of glory of the Leader (quod non ..!) — should come to their bossy type or that empty vessel would have too little to do..?
When workers would come to their bossy types with problems and solutions, the latter would be degraded to secretaries of the collect-input-collate-and-report types. Because that would be what they’d do;
And not would they be the emperors in charge of Decision Making (preference ratification) over proposals (researched scenarios / preferences) to solve problems, as that suggests managers of this type, would have any inside knowledge. True, sometimes, very sometimes, one meets these old-style (old school is too old school) true managers that actually have the best of knowledge over the problem at hand, and knowledge of the environment, context and strategies surrounding and/or overarching the decision, at the same level as the workers doing the solutions research.
If the manager would really have better info on the latter categories than his workers, he’d have failed to give them proper information (mention not the risk of the atrocious destruction of humanity that micro management is) i.e. not delegated properly, for the scenarios of the workers would limp and be of greatly suboptimal quality to his decision making;
Rare then, would be the true manager, that has sufficient knowledge nay wisdom to know how much to decide himself and what swarms of decisions to delegate and sit as go-beween and stakeholder representative of his workers to other departments and upper regions, facilitating whatever goes around in his department;
Rare then, the manager that says, can handle: “Solve what you can and report the solutions via my business office; bring me not solutions but problems that need over-head resolution”. Not the mis-quote; they’d not say that which makes it the one deserved, righteous forms of humblebragging-by-remaining-silent allowed.

However rare … the quote is still a misquote. As so many are of the manager type of the first couple of bullets, and say the thing only when they intend to degrade themselves to the pitiful that don’t see their own empty-vesselness when uttering the quote.

Oh, and:

[If you think you’re in, you aren’t; Utrecht]

Plusquote, nevertheless good to have been ousted

Of course referring to the little guy’s family name. Here, because of his sound advice on how strategic planning should be done:

You engage, and then you wait and see.

First off of(f) course, he wasn’t particularly little it was just that his generals next to him, were long.
Second, he’s right, about the above approach. Reminder: Some later giant took the above and expanded, explained, it more in the style of his countrymen’s need for rambling-on notation. And quoting some latter-day possibly (!) overrated general, “Plans are nothing, planning is everything.” which again is the same thing. In the core, right. Also for business today; how could anyone pretend to be able to predict even the nearest of future better than such an eminent strategist ..? If, then despicable.

Third, did anyone mention that the abovementioned frog, and all others involved except some who couldn’t handle the truth (sic), found William II superior to some other, now much revered, general (Et moi je vous dis que Wellington est un mauvais général, que les Anglais sont de mauvaises troupes et que ce sera l’affaire d’un déjeuner) that just sat there and was almost annihilated by the French if it hadn’t been for the protraction and depletion at Quatre Bras and other places (Hougoumont, much?), by others mainly, so Blücher could arrive in time.

Enough for now, with:

[Myopia, caused; Amsterdam]

For members, useful insights

I’d suggest making this available widely; beyond membership only. Because it ties in so well with, e.g., this and many other issues at this.

Yes, I may be biased; just like everyone if only for having been member of this. Which (subject) plays a much more prominent role in your lives than you think, certainly in the nearest of futures. Beware.

And be aware of:

[Your ethics reasoning: All corners, leading nowhere, abandoned; Fabrique Utrecht]

Move; to Canadaya ..?

While discussing the options for those in developed countries that would not necessarily agree with the outcomes of recent or pending elections, of course Canada was on the table. Not quite in the Tim Horton / Hudson’s Bay / Blue Jays style, but rather as evac site. Not the Thinking Class leaving, but the retreat of the Others [needless to say, the 1%-and-up aren’t anywhere anymore already; they escape no matter which way the wind blows] is what we have seen with/before/at the Elections in this case; back into the countryside as if the cities aren’t the major country elements these days (‘states’ and electoral colleges as artifacts, makeshift solutions to early-days haphazard nationwide (then, more height than width) comms).

Or still, nevertheless, this here old (Spring) post may provide an option.
Which is perfectly possible; aren’t they where they’d retreat in the first place? But that would bring the ‘risk’ [ P(X)=1 ] that it turns out that the ones not retreating into the billyhills, can perfectly do without the retreaters [many letters in common with traitors], or even fare better.
Calling into question whether the pres that will ‘represent’ all, does, for all or doesn’t, for a majority (!) thus undermining the very idea of validity of the representer in that position and the systems/schemata of elections that brought him there despite the majority not wanting him.

Interesting.

May still bring the near-(sic) Yucatan arrangement closer.

Oh well, plus:

[Defensible against those so utterly bluntly lied to, but also my next / client offices; Breda]

First Rule of Risk

First rule of risk: Never underestimate risk. Even when you follow this rule, and even when your estimates seem ‘proper’.
Where of course, the propriety of your estimates is in grave doubt, either on the “This has never happened to us so / Come on, get real, [we’re not a target because we’re of no interest to anyone] what are the odds!? / Ho hum, there’s the boy cried wolf again”,
or on the “I’ve been reading this thing about CYBER! Arrrgh! In the Inquirer so why aren’t all staff hiding under their desk and we didn’t yet have the Marines take over and destroy the office to defend it ..?” FUD-side.
[Side note: You did have ‘consultants’ over (office (culture, motivation) destroyed, seems like a preventative measure?), but be aware that’s the opposite of Oorah]

Because when every nanosecond brings the possibility of an ‘event’ (how’s the repeat of sampling with (! … is it?) replacement over so many draws working out in your frequency estimations..!?), one can be sure that a 99% chance of something not happening, will result not in the virtually certainly not happening every time, but in the certainty that the 1% will strike, repeatedly, and a strike will endure much, much, much longer that the inception of it. The ‘event’ isn’t measured in nanoseconds, but in days, weeks, months and sometimes even years (think the, near-certain, reputational damage). So, your estimates are too low, all too low.

But since the detractors are always downplaying your estimates due to their other-directed agendas, do follow the First Rule of Risk …

[Your in-house security gurus are quite like that, yes, being the absolute rookies at the BlahBlah Seat At The Board Table — probably available only when the Board is out — or any level they’re relegated to]