Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies on data protection

What we saw last week of the Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg two day testimony in front of nearly a hundred law makers of the United States house and senate was remarkable. The whole discussion centered on privacy and trust, in both the corporations and the governments, as it relates to data. Being in the industry from a technology perspective I was able to interpret the discussion through my introspective lens.

Knowing the history of these types of committees, they have immense authority including the power to regulate or breakup companies that get too much power and wealth. The politicians from both spectrums of the national parties spoke with the same message that there was a choice of government regulation or corporation self-regulation based on where the trust would best be stored and where it best can remain.

This stems from Facebook’s user’s data being provided to third party companies such as Cambridge Analytica who potentially used this data for nefarious reasons, including with the interference of electoral processes.

If the decision is to be government mandated controls, it would be accompanied with other implication such as a class action lawsuit file by as many as 87 million Facebook users whom may have had their Facebook data collected without their permission. Further consequences would be breaking up of the company, mandatory sharing of data for extreme vetting to help ICE in deportation efforts, mandating auditing of third party storage, consequences towards presumed violation of the FTC consent decree placed on Facebook, violation of corporate contribution laws, and even charges of treason as it relates to citizens data heading overseas to potential enemies of the state, referred to as ‘Russians’, and used in electoral interference.

An area Mr. Zuckerberg was reluctant to expose was how many ‘data points’, the term used by the members, Facebook collects on users. The general speculation is that it’s thousands per user, to the point where they know you better than yourself. This is another area of concern for some members who represent predominantly black communicates in which ad targeting was done by segmentation based on race. The main point drawn by Mr. Zuckerberg is that Facebook does not use this data but rather matches users with certain data points to advertisers searching on these specifics. Only upon a successful match does the company earn revenue.

This hearing was insightful in that we got to see the inner workings of the Facebook business model and value chain. In general the more specific data points per user helps the company generate more segments, some of which have greater value than others. What it further seems is that the Facebook algorithms promote a ‘positive feedback loop’ used to coral users into more extreme viewpoints to generate more revenue by creating controversy!

One main concern expressed by the politicians was the silencing of conservative voices. Facebook’s solution towards monitoring speech is to hire individuals who are located throughout the world to police content until the Artificial Intelligence (AI) is able to take over. My main concern is who will provide the rules of the road to this AI? What if it is learning by the current content being blocked, such as those brought up by the members of the YouTube personality stars Diamond and Silk or the Pro-life organizations? This is a very slippery road, and from the US perspective, the first amendment to the Constitution should hold true of freedom of speech. Perhaps a better and cheaper solution would be a more hands-off approach.

Another area of concern brought up by a congressman was regarding a chat application called Whatsapp that is owned by Facebook. The implication made was that messages are, or would be, read by algorithms that then would work with other ad systems without human intervention, yet the perception of users is that their messages were private.

A few politicians had concerns around the implication that Facebook creates ‘Shadow User’ accounts. These are non-users who have a profile within Facebook that was constructed off data collected from individuals in common that have installed the mobile app on their device and gave permission to this app to access their phonebook. Facebook may be able to commoditize these shadow accounts without consent via website targeted ads. The business strategy is great, with the obvious missed step of legal implications, or the thought that the benefit would outway the costs. Steps can get missed if you don’t have an experienced team, which is tough when you’re on the cutting edge.

Because Facebook is trail blazing in areas without precedent, congress was eagerly asking Mr. Zuckerberg to take lead in implementing industry standards. They want to ensure industry and progress isn’t hindered through over-regulation.

The general tone was that the members do not want to regulate so long as Facebook makes major concessions and ‘leads the charge’ towards having other technology companies agree to a kind of code-of-conduct towards privacy and security measures.

There was much legislation mentioned during the sessions, of which included the: Honest ads act, SESTA (Sex and human trafficking), Consent Act, Child Online Privacy and Protection Online Act, Browser Act (Privacy legislation), Secure and Protect Data Act, GDPR, My data act, etc.). If I had to take a broad view at summarizing the points brought as it relates to the legislation, which I’ll call the online Bill of Rights, it would include the following:

1. Platforms should be ideological Neutral as a public forum (First Amendment of the Constitution)
2. Not to engage in harmful content such as racism, nudity, terrorism, violence, sex and human trafficking.
3. Understanding the beneficial owner of political and issue ads using government identity and address verification.
4. Mandatory opt-in and explanation of how their data will be used
5. Readable contracts that have to fit on one page.
6. Users own their data (and can get a portion of revenue it generates)
7. Companies have an information fiduciary to hold personal data in trust
8. No commercial use of biometrics data
9. Targeting ads should be on data authorized to share
10. Not capturing race or gender in their segments of housing, employment, and credit.
11. No discriminatory ads on race, gender, family status, sexual orientation, disability, or veteran status using ad targeting
12. No capturing or creating of ‘shadow user’ information or accounts
13. Limit how many data points, or specific data points, per user.
14. Time limit for responding to request to delete a user’s data
15. Delete data after certain period (7 years just like the banks)
16. Users request to be deleted should be applied to third parties who their data was shared.
17. Data stored within the borders of the nation
18. Notifying users when there is a breach
19. Notify users when their data is being shared and allowing to prohibit this sharing
20. Affirmative permission before being used on other networks
21. No cross device tracking
22. No pixel tracking
23. Provide protection for those less than 16 years old by not using their data without permission of their parents
24. All data deleted of users under the age of 13
25. Government access to data in a national security situation such as election interference
26. Not allow sale by online pharmacies (in order to prevent the opioid crisis)
27. Bug bounties to also focus on not permissible sharing of information.

I’m not saying all these points are good, specifically the pixel and cross device tracking, but it was what I have captured. In my opinion these really should scale depending on the size of a company’s user-base. Implementing this type of regulation for a startup would be capital intensive and would burden new entrants into the market. In general users are in some way responsible for what they share on the internet.

I do not blame Facebook for offering targeted advertisements as some people prefer to see ads that are relevant. This isn’t a bad business model, and it looks for the most part that Facebook is being reactive when encountering new unforeseen issues. A lot of methodology is placed on a positive experience for the users in the creation of applications and platforms through the usability experience (UX) stage of development. It is known that companies gauge dopamine reactions of users and for some business models this is great. For example, if applied towards devices that offer health tracking in order to give incentives towards achieving a certain milestones.

Hypothetically, the alternative for these companies, if the majority of users choose not to share their data with advertisers, these companies could potentially be pay-per-play, a subscription service, or an alternative more creative solution.

If the trust was to remain with what they call ‘edge platforms’ through self-regulation, other tech companies that fall into this category would also need to follow suit, such as Instagram, Google, Amazon, Twitter, Netflix, and many others. To be specific, it would definitely affect every Ad-based business models. I suspect that these sessions will continue outside the realm of ‘edge platforms’ as politicians look at technology companies to determine if acts of treason were committed such as in audio being listened to on devices with Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s Android.

It wasn’t all doom and gloom for Facebook. There were incentives presented to Mr. Zuckerberg, such as the Senator from West Virginia who referenced a need for rural connectivity. Mr. Zuckerberg was quite eager and chomping at the bit when presented with these incentives as this is an area the Facebook is actively pursuing using drone technology.

The question remains of who to trust with online governance. On the other side of the spectrum is the Federal government holding this trust. The politicians self-admittedly stated that they did not want to impose government regulations. Also, the track record of the Governments doesn’t seem to be any better in having the trust of the people be broken by tapping phones of ordinary citizens.

I would prefer that Facebook leads this charge towards an online bill or rights, as the strongest power is not ruled by force but by vision.

Alphabet Inc.

Google, the company that outgrew itself, did something equivalent of being reborn, but in the no-living sense of the word. It spun off its old self, and began anew. Google, now the former, will be a company of its own run by a new talented CEO. The new, has spun off into the parent company and is known as Alphabet Inc.. 

This new mega-parent-company will have a number of subsidiaries beneath it, not withstanding Google, Google X, Google Fiber, Google Ventures, Google Capital, Calico, Nest Labs, along future others. Its new purpose will be to be all encamping, to cover all aspects of interactions. I already highlighted this in one of my former blog entries whereby I introduced a Google alphabet in pictorial form where each letter was the logo of a Google Brand. But its choice in domain even more clearly spells it out abc.xyz, pun intended. In this domain name choice, they show they cover beginning to end, a-to-z, alpha to omega. 

I believe one of the key pieces to this would be the further development of artificial intelligence (AI). This area has shown great potential, through the most recent examples of where different artificial speech engines were communicating with each other in a quite comical manner. Another very exciting example of where an artificial intelligence machine was able to determine self-awareness, granted it was in comparison to other AIs and not to human beings.

I look forward to seeing what the future holds, in a rightfully skeptical manner. I’m sure in any event, it will be an exciting time.

A Blackberry by any other Name

Recently I got the chance to use the latest Blackberry Z10. I was all enthusiastic for many reasons, including that there was all this hype around the latest model releases, that my own device had just suffered a screen shattering fall, and lastly that it was a Canadian company. This last point was quite important to me as I believe very strongly in the ‘brand Canada’, however to my dismay I was disappointed, or to my compatriots, ‘J'ai été très déçu’.

I’ve listed some of the main reasons that formed by opinion. I must note that I was coming from an Android device.

1. Copying text – I wasn’t able to figure out how to copy a portion of a text message in order so that I could paste it elsewhere. This was so that I could register into the blackberry world (their area to download apps), in which they send you a text message so that you can past the sent code into the registration screen. I asked various people in my office, including someone who owns a Z10, but alas the best I was able to do was copy the whole line and then go in and edit once pasted.
2. Lack of applications – There aren’t too many applications I use, but you would imagine the big ones such as Instagram should be available, even though I’m not a heavy Instagram user. The other significant missing one was the Gmail application. I know I can add it to the regular email, but I would like to have it as an application. (I recognize that I may be biased as I’m coming from an Android operating system which is built by Google who runs Gmail). The last is no support for Swype or Touchpal, but you can read more about this in point number 3.
3. 'Pecking' at the keyboard – I used to have the Blackberry with the built in keyboard and loved it specifically for that reason. I couldn’t bear to give up my keyboard until I discovered the ability to swipe my words. Having to ‘peck’ at the buttons on a keyboard on a touch screen is the most annoying thing in a phone and something that is a deal breaker for me. Swiping is the ability to press on the first letter of your desired word, swipe to each following letter, and then ultimately remove your finger when you’ve reached the final letter. In addition, the removal of your finger adds a space before the next word is typed. Once you get used to this, there’s no substitute.
4. Home screen icons - Deleting icons on the home screens seems as if it’s not possible, except for a select few. There’s no way I’ll need to use all the preinstalled applications, so not having the ability to streamline my searching for apps that I’ll use can be a real nuisance to the functionality of the phone. My advice to anyone creating systems, platforms, devices, etc., is to make it easy for the customers to use, download, configure, or buy your product.
5. Help the Help Section – In trying to figure out issue 1 listed above I went to the help section. This section was really slow at loading to the point where I thought it wasn’t working. The more surprising thing once loaded and I proceeded to search and tried returning to a previous page was that it hadn’t cached that previous page, thus experiencing the same slowness.

As a Canadian it pains me that this was not a positive experience. The device was glitchy and non-logical to use in addition to being large and bulky. It seems the moniker of crackberry will soon be replaced with crapberry. This is already begging to show through the dismal earnings they experienced in the latest quarter. I feel that unless they undergo major changes they will soon be on death watch.

Top 10 Travel Smart Phone Applications

Recently, having spent some significant time away from home while exploring parts of the world, I found the convenience of a smart phone loaded with applications to be paramount. I have created a list from those certain applications that I don't know how I would travel in a strange country without in the future. This list includes:

1. Google Maps, especially the download offline feature where you can continue to explore a city's streets whilst being disconnected from any data connection.
2. Google Translate is especially helpful when ordering food. Often being proficient in a language isn't enough for understanding local cuisine.
3. Skype phone calls have improved significantly since the last time I used them. As long as you have a data connection then this application is great for staying in touch with friends, family, or conducting meetings.
4. TripAdvisor for checking the ratings of hotels, restaurants, and attractions. It is quite accurate and user comments often have tidbits.
5. Hotels.com and booking.com for assisting you in getting the best prices on hotels, besides walking into them and offering cash for the room.
6. XE Currency calculator to understand the different currencies you may be dealing in. This application can store multiple currencies, is easy to use, and updates automatically when there is a data connection.
7. ITA on the Fly is the best free flight search engine to shop for the cheapest days and flight airfares for any itinerary in the world.
8. Built in applications which come standard on any smart phone such as calculator, weather, calendar, alarm clock, international clock, and camera will help you significantly.
9. Dropbox and Google Drive are great for reviewing either your itinerary, or PDF copies of tickets you maybe have registered.
10. A danger zone app that vibrates when in a yellow or even red danger zone area. This could be a life saving app after having scary encounters walking through certain streets on my trip. This is a fictitious application, however I could see the benefits if it were created. The only caveat is that you would need a data connection in order for the application to determine you current location.

Technology Evolution

Technology naturally progresses forward, always improving. There are instances though where significant leaps occur, such as the introduction of the combustion engine sparking the industrial revolution. More recent examples has been the personal computer followed by the internet and even more recent the birth of Google search capabilities. Since this time Google has remained a leader and an innovator, pushing boundaries and creating markets.

Some of the most recent and significant areas where Google is improving technology are in 3D imagery implemented into their mapping service, pushing the innovation and adoption of IPv6, treating Google search results as thoughts, and the introduction of Google Glass.

3D imagery

With the world's most popular digital mapping service, Google has recently included auto-generated three-dimensional images into their service visible in applications such as Google Earth. They are using military grade spy planes to take photos of major cities and communities and integrating them in a 3D manner using their new mesh technology. These 3D mesh buildings have now replaced user submitted 3D buildings from the Geo-modeler community and have a much greater level of detail.

This improvement will now allow for greater uniformity in order to compete with other platforms and fend off competitors such as Nokia maps and more specifically Apple, who has cancelled their contract with Google and started using similar technology towards their own mapping service.

With every technology that pushes the boundaries come certain challenges. In the case of 3D imagery it is the resistance from citizens and government. The new technology is so precise it can recognize an individual’s face from 10,000 feet up. As a result, Senator Schumer has called upon companies using this technology to make some concessions. They include notification of communities before they are mapped, blurring out individuals, letting property owners opt out of mapping, and blurring out sensitive infrastructure details.

IPv6

Just as phones use a system of phone numbers to place calls, every Internet-connected device gets assigned a unique number known as an "IP address". With the proliferation of Internet connected devices the current architecture built on IPv4 (32 bit) has now run out of IP address space.

We have been using workarounds such as special hardware like Network address translation (NAT) devices and accompanying software to extend our ability to use IPv4 and accommodate the decreasing availability of IP addresses. This however has not been ideal as there is a large layer of complexity for the network engineers and the data packets to accommodate for in reaching their destinations.

Google is encouraging adoption the IPv4 sequel through an Internet Society event called the World IPv6 Launch. IPv6 was standardized in 1996 and allows for a lot more IP address space (128 bit). Last month IPv6 was turned however it remains able to work in parallel with IPv4. Vint Cerf, the current Chief Internet Evangelist at Google, and considered as a founding father of the Internet, discussed the next version of the Internet, IPv6, and why we need it.

“World IPv6 Launch marks a watershed moment in Internet history. It breaks the limits of the original address space to open a vast new territory, trillions upon trillions of times larger, and reinforces the end-to-end architecture that made the Internet so powerful at the beginning. Google strongly supports this upgrade. We’re happy to see that everyone is moving to the 21st-century Internet!”

This new capability allows for an 'internet of things', a term coined by Vint, would include appliances, devices, and even light bulbs to the internet world.

Knowledge Graph

You may have noticed recently when doing a Google search that a panel on the right hand side now displays next to the search results. This is referred to them as a Google Knowledge graph.

The Panel results are a composition of collecting information on objects in the real world and forming connections between them with combining information that others find useful from previous positive search results.

These are the first enhancements towards moving from an information engine to a knowledge engine. The results presented will more and more resemble human thoughts as Google will continue to grow the graph and make it richer.

With so much information out there and with so many queries used towards understanding this information Google will better understand the user queries and understand what information is out there on the web. Through time they will connect these queries with the understanding of the information in an intellectual comprehensible manner.

Google Glass

Project Glass is a research and development program by Google. It is focused on the development of an augmented reality head-mounted display that is hands free allowing for displaying of information currently available to most Smartphone users, and allowing for interaction with the Internet via natural language voice commands.

Although head-worn displays for augmented reality is not a new concept, this is backed by Google, running on an Android OS and using their voice search technologies. The first Project Glass demo resembles a pair of normal eyeglasses where the lens is replaced by a heads-up display. In the future, new designs may allow integration of the display into people's normal eye wear or even their contact lenses.

Summary

Google may seem like they are at the forefront of many of the latest internet-based evolutionary technologies, but we can see that this is because these technologies are complementary and reliant on each other.

IPv6 will allow for better ability towards pushing their ever increasing bandwidth intensive service, such as 3D maps, introduction of Google Glass device, and the more elaborate search results. The connection between 3D maps and Google Glass are obvious in that they enhance each other's experiences; Google Earth having more up-to-date imagery submitted via Google Glass while Google Glass viewers having access Street View in a 3D manner due to their 3d mesh technology. People will be conducting searches more frequently and in new manners with the new Google Glass device. They will be submitting voice searches and express their searches as thoughts that will include images and sounds. The results will be these knowledge graphs that are more graphical and more intuitive to those using this device.

There is a symbiotic relationship between all these innovations that drive the others, in which Google seems to be on an upward spiral heading to the future ensuring their place as a leader and an innovator, pushing boundaries and creating markets.

MF Global is the Canary in the Gold Mine

In this crazy market we see companies have learnt how to pray on others for self-preservation, to remain standing the next morning. The long term survival however is not realized, whereby they eventually fall from this short view behaviour. If all the firms participating in the particular market have the same strategy, it leaves the industry falling apart as customers will no longer want to participate in that market.

When growth and expansion beyond means is the desire, an overstepping of the natural balance occurs. We see this in the case of MF Global Inc. who tried this tactic which resulted in their demise. The institution took segregated account savings from individuals and invested it in the derivatives market at 40:1 odds and lost. Individuals were financially hurt and have yet to have proper resolutions towards their damages.

This story is not a new one as we have seen from the savings and loans crises in the 70s. The Glass–Steagall Act was introduced that outlined how financial institutions were to govern themselves in the market. Since then, segregated accounts were off-limits and not to be touched for the purpose of investing. This however was repealed by the Bill Clinton administration in 1995 thus allowing a repeat starting with the mortgage crises in 2008.

Unknown elements in the story are complicating the situation. There have been discussions around the silver holdings of MF Global and the speculation that this was orchestrated by the ComEx and certain financial interests (such as JP Morgan) as they are feeling the squeeze from the silver shorts. It is said that Corzine was ordered to conduct the losing bet in order to divest the corporation of its silver holdings. This starts sounding very much like a fantastical conspiracy, until we look into the type of bet that was taken. Not only did it involve the segregated funds, but they decided to leverage over $40 of liabilities for every $1 of assets in risky sovereign debt trades at the urging of John Corzine.

When we look at Corzine's background, we see he has a net worth of over 175 million dollars, a former Governor, former US Senator, and former co-CEO of Goldman Sacks. It is unfathomable to think that pure ignorance is at play but rather criminal intent. Additionally, there was supposed to be compliance controls, not just within MF Global but with other organizations. This would include PwC as the auditor and entity that setup the SOx controls within the organization. JP Morgan would also be a complacent party as they were the primary banker to MF Global and the trustee on the bond issue. The bankruptcy has been structured to put JP Morgan first to paying the customers.

MF customer funds should always have remained segregated and for that reason they should be paid first and made whole. Louis Free, the trustee for the parent company MF Global Holdings Ltd. is arguing against this stance. He states that this shouldn't apply to brokerage liquidations and that the creditors should be paid first instead of the customers. Of the missing $1.2 billion (or $1.6 billion depending who you ask) dollars, the only individuals that I've heard of that have been made whole were Canadian citizens, due to the laws which cover investing activities in Canada and those benefiting from this past weekend's announced settlement. A hedge fund manager has been ordered to pay $405 million to the victims whereby a portion of the investors will receive about 40 per cent of their losses, and up to $5 million.

The organizations to which the responsibility of control in a scenario like this falls to the CME Group and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The CME is tasked to ensure that member firms in the market of exchange abide by the laws to protect the investors, and in the event of an incident, they are to make good on the losses. The FDIC is tasked to maintain stability and public confidence in a nation's financial system by insuring deposits. However, what we see is that the CME didn't protect the 60k clients invested in commodities and refused to cover their loses and the FDIC has also remained mum on the subject.

This is setting precedence not deterring individuals and corporations from committing financial fraud. With the no resolution or remedies proposed, the precedence is that the customers are the last in line when these firms go bankrupt to collect on assets. This becomes an unnatural order with serious ramifications that will trickle through the finance world, starting specifically with the futures market. The purpose of going into the futures market is to reduce risk. Investors will not want to be burnt twice, forcing the collapse of capital flowing through this market. The knock-on effects of introducing futures risk will move into a more physical market of how farmers farm, how miners mine, how oil gets explored, etc. 

The markets are starting to destabilize and it will be more evident when credit starts contracting. MF Global is the canary in the silver and gold mines, just as the canary was used in the coal mine to detect for toxic fumes. The toxic fumes are symbolic of the toxic credit derivatives that have been plaguing companies. MF Global being the next victim will trigger the next leg down for the financial crises we are entering. They have destroyed the understanding of broker dealers acting as independent custodians for customer funds.

We can take a lesson from someone who knows the inside workings of the financial system, Mr. Berni Madoff himself, who stated "the whole government is a Ponzi scheme". When more and more individuals start to realize this we'll see a credit contraction happen starting with the derivatives market. From there it will collapse the miscellaneous assets, securitized debt/stocks, sovereign currency such as Bonds, then finally the only credit left standing would be paper fiat currencies themselves. After this, precious metals such as silver and gold will be the last store of wealth and meet the definition of money/currency.

Trace Mayer elaborates on this concept in his eBook "The Great Credit Contraction" in which he so succinctly states that 'the system does not collapse but 'evaporates'. This is very accurate when we see statements such as that from the WSJ where they say the stolen MF Global funds have been 'vaporized'. This is a sign that we have reached the first stages of this credit contraction, soon we will see banks start to show their insolvency. When we realize that they can't all be bailed out, there are going to be bank failures pushing us into the next level down of contraction.

Drastic and draconian measures will be taken to keep the system propped up. Argentina exemplifies these measures with the passing of their version of the NDAA, where you can get 15 years in jail if they don't like how you're taking your money out of the system. This is due to their broad definition of terrorism that now includes taking money out of the bank.

This contraction period starts creating waves closer to Main Street where the purchasing power of the fiat currency will continue to diminish and will be noticed more and more by regular citizens. Eventually we can soon see bank holidays such is currently the case in Italy. Currencies will be revalued and specifically devalued where the value of the savers money (read savings) will be made to cover the bad debt. This will be called the greatest robbery in history with the likes of JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs at the helm.

Raoul's Right Brain Blog

This is just to note that the format for my blog will change slightly. I've started a second blog which will focus a bit more on my creative side; I've called it Raoul's Right Brain Blog and can be found here http://rightbrainraoul.blogspot.ca/

This current blog will remain dedicated to the more cerebral topics such as technology, finance, and politics. I'm still debating if I will use this as a venue towards health topics which I as well like to cover or if I'll just publish them elsewhere.

The Death of Sovereignty

It used to be that treaties were seen as a positive resolution between nations. I recount the Treaty of Paris which ended the American Revolutionary War between Great Britain and the United States of America. These treaties defined the grounds for which the participating nations would act and intern provide a form of understood sovereignty.

A proper functioning nation is one that is sovereign without allegiances to other countries or individuals. What we are finding is that this sovereignty is being degraded by the likes of modern day treaties which are claiming to have supranational authority, in essence superseding the sovereignty of the participating nations. This is exampled by the Treaty of Lisbon which has forced the hand of signatory nations to abide to Commissions and Institutes who dictate the manner in which they are to govern their own countries. These movements give way to the 'nation-states', most notably that being the European Union.

Within this nation-state you have countries that suspended democracy and gave up their sovereignty by allowing self-proclaimed 'leaders' to act in a dictatorial manner, or as they like to refer to themselves as the technocrats. Two countries within the EU that have succumbed to this anti-democratic regime of an unelected 'leader' are the Italian prime minister designate, Mario Monti, and the Greek prime minister designate, Lucas Papademos. The commonality between these Technocrats, besides being unelected, is that they stem from the banking system and are acting in the best interest of these financial institutions with the likes of Goldman Sachs. This puts them in direct odds with the interests of the citizens which they are to represent.

It is only a matter of time before other countries such as Spain, Portugal and Ireland start following suit. Once signed onto this new framework it exposes the evils tied into the Treaty of Lisbon and it will be too late. As an alternative we can look at Iceland for direction on how they handled their debt situation without giving up sovereignty and showing that there is a better alternative.

Today, treaties have changed by taking on a new identity under the guise of a more eloquently sounding Trade Agreements. Alongside these are other legal frameworks that are instituted in one country and are followed by cooperating countries whose sovereignty is given up in this process. A few examples include NAFTA, ACTA, PIPA, and SOPA, and UN Agenda 21 to name a few. Even at a city level we see this type of framework being instituted, such as those cities that sign up to ICLEI. These frameworks are based on global governance using a socialistic flavour, and destroy the freedoms and rights of its populace such as private property rights.

If there is no support by the citizenry for these frameworks then the people will force alternatives that support sovereignty. My desire is that the lawmakers are more attentive to the areas which contradict the laws of the participating nations when contemplating and entering into these legal frameworks.

These nations however should also realize that their laws come first.  A minor exception is in the United States where the majority of the individual States laws come first as the States collectively make up what is known as their Federal government. An example of where this was exercised in taking down these sovereign killing framework is in the State of Virginia where they managed to nullified the NDAA. Other success stories towards fighting down legal frameworks aside from the earlier example of Iceland, with respect to how they successfully navigated their nation debt issues without giving up their sovereignty, would be Poland and how the citizenry took to the streets and achieved political persuasion, forcing the country to retract their support of the ACTA treaty.

It is through the support of the citizenry that nation laws have power and it is in the best interest of these individuals from those nations to remain sovereign.

The Puppet Masters behind the Curtain

When looking at these global "manipulated-like" fluctuations in the world of finance and how governments tend to move in lockstep unity when conducting such actions as passing laws with identical timing. I look at the passing of bills preventing pharmaceutical companies from being criminally charged with respect to the damages that their vaccines cause. All this makes you wonder if there is a bigger hand at play. During my economic courses I was taught about the invisible hand and its manner in which the market reacts to its movements. This concept was about how capitalism dictates directions of markets with the inputs of supply and demand. More and more we see that this concept is a farce, with the invisible hand being the regulations, policies, and intrudes of governments. It is no longer an invisible hand, it is those who change the rules of the game. These rules change drastically when looking at the worlds' largest economy the United States whose government is now also the largest employer. They are involved in the automotive industry, health care, banking, insurance, and of course homeland security - just to name a few. Technically this is now closely considered a fascist form of government, even probably more suited, a Corporatism government, which does not allow for capitalism in the true sense of it being free.

This invisible hand covered by the government glove, is realized to belong to particular families of extreme wealth who influence this hand towards their favour. Of note are a few families, but two that particular sickout are the Rothschild and the Rockefeller dynasties. Now this starts falling into the realm of conspiracy theory, until it becomes reality through literal self-admittance and judicial proceeding outcomes. I will dilate upon them with the former of self-admittance using the following few examples:

From the book 'Memoirs' by David Rockefeller, on page 405 he states:
•    "Some even believe we [Rockefeller family] are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure - One World, if you will. If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it."

David Rockefeller to Trilateral Commission in 1991 showing how the MSM (Lame Street Media) is  the lap-dog to these entities:
•    "We are grateful to The Washington Post, The New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost forty years. It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subject to the bright lights of publicity during those years. But, the work is now much more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a World Government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries"

Amsel (Amschel) Bauer Mayer Rothschild, 1838:
•    "Let me issue and control a Nation's money and I care not who makes its laws".

Nathan Rothschild:
•    "I care not what puppet  is placed on the throne of England to rule the Empire. The  man who controls Britain's money supply controls the  British Empire and I control the British money supply."

With the later, we just recently saw an interesting case with just of an interesting judicial outcome. From Reuters (http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/02/10/uk-britain-rothschild-idUKTRE81917020120210) we see the article entitled "Rothschild loses 'puppet master' libel case".  It goes on to expands on how Nathan Rothschild lost a libel case that depicted him as a "puppet master" who used his friendship with a European trade chief to impress a Russian oligarch and help close a business deal.

We need to wonder in which kind of a society we truly live. The puppet masters are revealing themselves through their own attitudes of bombastic arrogant actions in thought, word and actions. So many quotes come to mind such as Mark Twain stating "Truth is stranger than fiction" in that this no less than ten years ago this would be considered topic of mock, however today is shown to be rather accurate.

As Theodore Roosevelt, Twenty-sixth President (1901-1909) of the United States, once stated that "In any moment of decision the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing." I ask you, the reader, when you look behind the curtain what is it you will do?

Irresponsible Gambling Council

Recently on the TTC I saw this advertisement for individuals who have gambling issues to seek assistance from the Responsible Gambling Council. What struck me as odd was that this was a pretty bare advertisement and at the bottom was an appeal to individuals with gambling mind to visit the site and take an online quiz for a chance at a home entertainment system.

 Hypocritical in that this organization is pretending to have virtues and principles, however by this action they do not actually have. In its basic sense hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie. Perhaps this is not gambling as there is nothing of risk other than ones' time, but it's appealing to the part of the mind that is affected by odds and desires to chance.

It would be a neat concept if this was to draw people to the site to notify them that an appeal to their gambling senses was used and that this is a call for them to seek assistance. But sadly it was not as I visited the site as you can see the screen capture below.

Mona Lisa Overlay

Recently it was discovered there was a copy of the infamous Mona Lisa painting by Leonardo Da Vinci. This replica was discovered in Spain’s Prado art museum and can be read further here http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/mona-lisas-twin-sister-is-discovered--500-years-late-6297843.html

What I have done is an overlay of one on top of the other. One thing to note, is that this new copy had a black backdrop, not the roaming hills that we're used to seeing. I have deferred to the more scenic background in this overlay. 

When doing this overlay I was able to see that the facial structure is almost identical on both paintings. Overall they are very similar with the differences lying in the body structure, such as one shoulder a bit lower than the other, and in the attire being a bit more elegant such as ruffles on the shirt wrists.