Have you been jonesing for another one of Fox News’ blatantly over the top articles that baselessly accuses something of being a major factor in the deterioration of the human condition? Well, John Brandon of Fox News has got a treat for you. In his recent article, “Is Bulletstorm the Worst Video Game in the World?”, Mr. Brandon does not hold back from pretty much making EA’s upcoming Bulletstorm the poster child for the decline of morality and increase of sexual violence in our culture. He uses sensationalism, questionable sources and false statements to get his point across while subtly revealing that he has little understanding of the topic he is covering. You many want to read the article first because I am going to break down my “favorite” parts. Go ahead, I will wait.
Ready? Okay, here we go…
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A meme has been spreading across Facebook recently exhorting people to change their Facebook profile picture to that of a cartoon character. The purpose:
In support of anti-child violence, change your Facebook profile picture to a cartoon from your childhood. Until Monday Dec. 6, there should be no human faces on Facebook, but an invasion of memories. Join the fight against CHILD ABUSE. Invite your friends to do the same.
TechCrunch is one of the biggest technology blogs out there, with a focus on up-and-coming tech companies, angel investing, and the like.
When the "Jenny Whiteboard" story hit the internet two weeks ago, it blew up thanks to a host of Facebook-forwarding, but also thanks to a couple popular websites like CollegeHumor.com and TechCrunch. I believe the above photo which was part of the photo sequence was designed to get the story posted up on TechCrunch.
I was out for a walk tonight with my lovely wife Meredith and chatting about Live Geek or Die and what I hope to accomplish with it. I spent the weekend at a conference talking about new media and came away from it re-energized about this little piece of the internet and what I want to do with it. Over the past few months I have allowed myself to come up with excuses as to why I couldn't post instead of just posting. And when I get right down to it, there really is only one reason - I don't want to suck.
On May 6 we wrote about the crazy market plunge in the NYSE that may have been triggered by human error and compounded by automated trading rules in place.
Today the Wall Street Journal reports that the SEC is considering implementing rules to prevent future errors from moving the market dramatically in a short period of time. Put simply, trading in stocks that move a certain percentage of price in a short period of time will be paused in order to try and prevent a crash. While I am not a financial expert, I believe the limits the SEC are proposing would still allow for a human-fueled selloff based on a bad earnings call or announcement, but would prevent an artificial selloff that has no basis in reality.
I'm glad that the reaction to this incident has been to examine the systems that drive the market and ensure that they don't artificially effect stock prices.
When I was in University I took a course entitled "Computer Risks." The course focused on the risks to society of poorly designed, planned, or managed computers or technology. We studied such cases as Clifford Stoll and the AT&T long distance outage. I left that course with an appreciation for how technology can sometimes magnify human errors, and unintended consequences are always possible.
It's this background that causes me to take a look at today's market plunge and the theory that it could have been triggered by a data entry error by a Citibank trader.