FREE SPEECH: a small-town newspaper goes to WAR

"Police raids newspaper" by Midjourney

The RECORD * in Marion, Kansas, (pop. less than 2,000), interviewed the new police chief.  The reporter asked some tough questions about his last job. Miffed, the pissed-off  PC got permits to raid the RECORD’s office and the home of its owner-publisher-editor, Eric Meyer  The day after the ruckus, Meyer’s 96-year-old mother died.  The RECORD headline is “SEIZED  but not SILENCED”. 

The Washington Post,**  New York Times, CNN, and MSNBC flew into the town to get the story - raids on newspapers are rare.  Aid for the paper poured in.  The RECORD’s 4,000 subscriptions jumped to 5,500, incl. mine.  Meyer, a former reporter/editor for Milwaukee’s biggest newspaper, taught Journalism at the  University of Illinois. He came back to Marion to take over the family newspaper. He says the RECOD’s top job is to keep tabs on the people who run the town.

The fact that the action took place in a small town made it easier for us to get a grip on what might happen in the Big World. So let’s give three cheers to Eric Meyer, his team, and the Marion County RECORD for fighting the good fight.  And hope to hell they hang in there and keep on digging up the dirt.

Note: Eric Meyer won this war: laptops, hard drives, and cell phones were returned. 

*Award for best mid-sized newspaper 2020. 2021, 2022

**Washington Post sent three reporters - the story was headline news.

Sources: New York Tims, Washington Post

Next week: TRUMP-SUMP:  VOTERS crave CRAP

"Freedom of press" by Midjourney

Note: Finland has been high on the freedom of the press ratings. I think we're still currently the 5th, but there have been some attempts lately at stifling that freedom. Unsurprisingly, it's the right fringe that tries to erode the trust in media and shut up any critical voices here too. And now that the people of Finland decided it's a good idea to let the right fringe actually run the country (there still are what I'd call "wannabe-nazis" in the cabinet) we're in for some rocky times.

The politicians already have started talking about cutting funding for YLE, the national broadcasting corporation, which has been probably the least biased media outlet we have. I think YLE leans too much to the right, and the right thinks they're commies, so they must be pretty much in the middle ;-)

The rest of the press is largely just chasing headlines, and as commercial entities owned by investors, the outlets also tend to lean to the right side of the aisle. While I do see them as biased, they still largely report the facts as they should, just filtered from their angle.

I'm afraid we're heading to the same direction as media in the US, and by my standards, that is unfortunate. No raids - yet - though.

CU

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Eki

HELL on EARTH: summer 2023

Sunglasses on Fire, by Midjourney AI

The cool and the dead.*

It may begin in the cracked throat, lips that stay dry no matter how many times they are licked. As the heat overwhelms the body, the heart throbs and vision gets blurry, before the world turns black.** 

The ‘Haves’ stay cool in air-conditioned comfort. ‘Have-nots’ are up shit-creek.

Whopping heatwaves hit the three top carbon dumpers, China (33%), America (14%), and India (7%). Per capita, the US gets the Booby prize.*** 

I spent a month in the US (CO, AZ, TX). A lot of it in cars. Public transport, except in the biggest cities, is sketchy. Approx 92% of Americans have cars, and 22% have three or more. EVs are making a dent, but gas-guzzlers rule. Air conditioning is a given, except for the poorest (for ex. migrant farm workers). Friends in Texas have been in AC - house, car, destination, for over a month. No end in sight.

Bad climate news plies in. Two Denmark university scientists warn that without action the Atlantic will be beyond repair by the end of the century - off the Florida coast the water registered 103 F. The New York Post reports the Gulfstream could collapse by 2025. Much of the Northern Hemisphere has been hit by heat. Even the ‘Haves’ have to hope electric grids won’t crap out. Owning a generator in the is a LA mode. It's not too far-fetched to think gas and electricity will be rationed, and pollutants banned. We've been warned... Will there be a crackdown? Or……Stick around and find out.

* Economist

 
** The Heat Will Kill You by Jeff Goodell, climate journalist

*** US: 134 .5°F / 56°C (Death Valley CA ), China: 125,5°F / 52.5°C, India: 124.8°F / 51°C

Sources: Economist, New York Times, Washington Post, New York Post, Internet, personal experience

Nest week. BARBIEmania 

Polar Bear In Sahara, by Midjourney AI

Note: On Monday, this summer's heat record for Finland was broken, around 92,5°F / 33,6°C. Nothing compared to the above numbers, but completely unbearable for a Finn. We do not really do AC here, except for cars and larger grocery stores, malls, etc. Most households just grin and bear it. It was a few degrees less and windy in Helsinki where I live, so outside was not too bad. But at home, top floor of a non-AC apartment building, well, hell on earth. I think the fact that our heat is not dry, but often moist and stale makes it harder to sustain.

This heat wave was not unexpected. Neither is the likely outcome that this year will set a new global temperature record. We know that the global temperature keeps rising at an alarming rate, and we also know that much of the yearly fluctuation comes from the La Nina / El Nino cycle. Very much simplified, when La Nina conditions prevail, the heat gets stored more in the ocean than usual, and the air gets (relatively) cooler. After a few years, the opposite happens with El Nino: the excess heat that was stored in the ocean gets released. The air temperatures get (relatively) hotter.

Last proper El Nino year was 2015 - obviously a record-hot year at the time. Since then, La Nina conditions have (relatively) cooled the atmosphere, masking most of the underlying warming. Even then, we've had global yearly temperature records - previously unimaginable in a La Nina year. 

This year is again an El Nino year. When this was forecasted in the spring, to me, it was a given that we will see nasty heat waves, and now that the prediction for the rest of the year is that El Nino will continue, 2023 breaking the hottest year record with a large margin is more or less certain. Global Warming pushes on unabated.

So, while this summer feels hot, don't worry, apart from some La Nina years within the next decade or so, this will be the coolest summer of the rest of our lives.

Oh, that is unless the warming breaks the Gulf Stream, the conveyor belt that brings heat to (northern) Europe. In that case, we will freeze here in Finland, and the rest of the world will heat up even more.

PS: That 2025 Gulf Stream figure is the theoretical worst of the worst cases scenario. The more likely date is sometime mid-century, and the collapse will probably be just partial. But that of course doesn't make nearly as cool headlines ;-)

CU

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Eki

FINLAND: the next RIVIERA?

Too hot, too crowded in France, Italy, Spain? Head north to Finland. The airport is a  perfect entree'. The new terminal, designed by ALA Architects* is a site for sore eyes and travel-weary bodies.  Beautiful, squeaky clean, easy to navigate. All the usual amenities, plus a super, supermarket to stock up before you head to your destination. Lots of transport to take you. Most Finns speak English.

Finland’s average summer temperature is around 20 - 25c. With approx. 6,000 islands and lake and sea-side cities, boats are the scenic way to get around. Ports along the way to stock up on provisions have a sauna and some land-life. Helsinki is a summer town. A walkable city center crammed with cultural sites, good restaurants, hotels, upscale shops, and world-class buildings designed by famous Finnish architects: for ex., Lars Sonck, Alar Aalto, Eliel Saarinen. Three distinct styles, Empire, National Romantic, and Modern make Helsinki a pilgrimage for architects from around the world.

But for a true taste of Finnish summer life, you have to go to the countryside. Islands are at the top of the list. Högsåra* is a perfect destination. Reached by ferry (with or without a car), or private boat. The Russian tsars knew a good thing: they made regular visits to Högsåra in their yachts. During the winter about 42 people live here. But in summer it buzzes. After finding a place to bed down (hotel, private house, Airbnb, a boat) the rest is easy. The whole island is walkable. A cafe’ serves lunch. Rumpanbar, on the Örnell family’s dock, has drinks, food, and music. You can reserve a sauna to have before you begin to party. The season officially begins with a celebration on the longest day of the year: Midsummer. And starts to shut down in August when Finns go back to work and the days get shorter and shorter, and……

*ALA  Architects designed Helsinki City Library, OODI, chosen “Library of the Year 2019” by the World Library congress.

**Eki and I made a doc on Högsåra: “El Gaucho de Hogsara” about a young guy from Argentina who lived with the Örnell family, fit right in, and learned how to sail.

Littlemargiedoc blog is on vacation till August

Note: Yea, Finland is a pretty neat place to be. In the summer. Right now, even down here in Helsinki, the sun barely sets. It never gets properly dark, we literally go straight from dusk to dawn.

Me, I like it. It's a reward for surviving those winter months when the sun barely rises.

But about the heat: hot summers are the new norm here too. There's a saying "The Finnish summer is short, but luckily there's not that much snow". It really has not aged well - climate change is inescapable. Right now, at 7.30 PM, it's still about +25°C outside. Dunno how many giraffes that is for those using the American scale instead of metric, but it's still too warm for my taste. I'm not going to even start with the shooting day we had today at a factory hall with a black roof.

Because we're up here in the "cold" north, air conditioning is not a given. Sure, the shopping centers are kept cool and inviting, but regular homes (and factories) often rely on just opening the windows.

Our home is no exception. I have a new beefy computer that does a great job at number crunching, as well as turning many hundreds of watts of computing power into heat. Usually one can add up to 10 degrees to the outside temperature here where I sit.

Scorchio!!

PS: Happy holidays folks, see you on the other side.

CU

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Eki

AI & US

"God-like AI" by Midjourney

AI is beginning to scare the bejeezus out of US. Elon Musk and other “luminaries’ urged companies to slow down “God-like” AI. Approx. 300m, mostly white-collar jobs will be taken over by AI. Teachers, telemarketers, and traders are at the top of the hit list. ChatbotGPT4, the must-have AI app speaks 5,000 languages (LLMs), but hallucinates and spouts fake info.

"DABUS" by Midjourney

A St. Lois Mo inventor, Stephen Thaler named his creation DABUS (Device for the Autonomous Botsstrappping of Unified Sentience). He thinks it thinks and feels. Thaler loves DABUS. When he shuts up shop and goes home he worries it’s lonesome. Is he nuts?

Yes, that's me on actual ink and paper... -Eki

Eki tracked AI’s speed-of-light catapult into the mainstream for Aamulehti. Journalist, Markus Määttänen referred to Kierkegaard to give a 19th C perspective on the 4th Industrial Revolution. In the Economist, historian/philosopher Yuval Noah Harari writes that AI has hacked the operating system of human civilization: “Unless we regulate AI it will destroy democracy”.  Geoffrey Hinton, AI's godfather who worked with the technology for 50 years tells us “There’s danger ahead”. Hold on to your seats folks, it's gonna be a wild ride.

* The Aamulehti AI article (translated)

Note: six AI illustrations for Gen Z LUDDITES  took approx. five minutes. Eki said pre-AI, if he could draw, they would have taken about two weeks.

Sources: Aanulehti, Economist, Financial Times, Washington Post, New York Times

Next week: FINLAND: the next RIVIERA?

Note: I guess the main fear is the fear of the unknown. We've never seen something like this as a species before (unless the Neanderthals were smarter than us). But here we are, and the unknown is hitting us with the speed of, well, something really fast.

When it comes to sentience, I still maintain the same stance as I did in my 15 minutes of Aamulehti fame: it's a matter of definition. Is AI sentient in the exact same way as we humans are? Of course not. Is it able to monitor its environment, make observations, use logic, and act accordingly... sure it is. Or, something to that order. 

There are AI-enabled robots that can pretty much do the whole enchilada, but things like ChatGPT are more limited for now. This said ChatGPT has gained the new ability to surf the internet, and there are plugins for other stuff too: for example, ChatGPT itself is unreliable at math, but it can now tap into Wolfram Alpha math engine, and suddenly it outperforms more or less every human at math. 

It's also getting more and more reliable. This can actually be a bad thing, because constantly hallucinating AI keeps the users on their toes, reminding us that the information may not be accurate. But what about the near future, when AI indeed is completely correct something like 99.9% of the time? That 0.01% error rate doesn't sound like much, but it can really cause big problems if everything the AI outputs is taken at face value when we're used to it "always" providing the perfect answer.

CU

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Eki

GenZ* LUDDITES switch OFF

 

"GenZ Luddites" by Midjourney AI

A bunch of kids got smart. Led by a teenage girl at a Brooklyn school,  they formed a club that switched from smartphones to flip phones. Every week they meet in a park to talk, draw,  paint, or just hang out. They don’t want your links or likes, they want to have fun. And maybe learn something. They were clever to cop the name, Luddites. It comes from the early 19th C weavers who smashed weaving machines in protest against the Industrial Revolution. The idea is hopping to other schools. They got a long article in the New York Times.

Teenage mental health crisis has been linked to social media - suicide is the second cause of death. These GenZ Luddites got the message: there are no upsides and a slew of downsides to being in touch 24/7. They want a time-out.  Their non-Luddite pals and their parents will have to get used to these kids roaming free for a while.

Eki and I have gone toe to toe about smartphones. He went on Google Science and found out there’s a health risk with over-use. Last time I checked girls text around 100X, boys 60X a day.  A while back we made a rap video: “Gotta Get in Touch”. When the two GenZ girls in the video heard it they said, “that’s us”. AI’s giant tech leap will make it easier to access social media. GenZ Luddites have taken a stand.  Let’s hope they started a peaceful revolution.

*GenZ (1997-2012), approx. 32% of the world’s population

Sources: New York Times, interest, Roberta Nelson

Next week: AI & US 

"Gluttony" by Midjourney AI

Note: 

Nah, I don't remember claiming there is a health risk for overuse of phones, but rather quite the opposite, I think?

Anyway, humans tend to be an addictive species, we get hooked on anything that provides the endorphin rush. To some, it's SoMe. To others, apparently, it's getting rid of SoMe. The general rule of gluttony works here too: anything is bad when used in excess, but most things are beneficial, or at least benign when used in moderation.

Luddites tend to always just get the short end of the stick.

CU

--

Eki

AIs & EKI pulled it off: the VIDEO

 

Mary Jane's pet gallery (Little Margie Productions 20©23)

After 'experimenting' for a year, it was a big kick to finally see what Eki and I had hashed out over. "Mary Jane's pet gallery" is 45', and has a point of view and a punch line. Eki was a brick to give me a first-level tutorial in the process. 

The year went by - ChatGPT and Midjorney changed our blog. The illustrations are on a whole other level. But it was a jolt when it wrote posts. When the New Yorker and the Economist used the same AI apps as Eki I was over the moon. 

All the way through the process I had no idea what the video would look like. The photos we took of the animals and the voiceover were done the old-fashioned way - on a smartphone. 

AI's infant stage is amazing. But when it gets to be a teenager and grows up will we love it, or will all hell break loose. In the meantime it's a runaway boffo: ChatGPT has over 100 million users. It was fun to jump at the beginning with our AI video. Check it out. 

Sources: Eki, Annie Lavigne (photos), Augustin du St Remy, and Maggy (voiceover)

Next week: GenZ (1997-2012) LUDDITES switch OFF

Note: First of all, i'll just paste the Youtube blurb here...

Mary Jane's pet gallery is an experiment in AI-assisted video production. All of the source material for this video was created using artificial intelligence. The gallery, all the paintings, and the starring pets were created using text-to-image AIs, namely Midjourney, Dall·E 2, and Stable Diffusion. The animation is a combination of traditional techniques and warping using AI-generated depth maps. The facial animation for the pig was created using thin-plate-spline-motion AI model, transferring the motion from a video from Maggy's live performance, recorded with a cell phone. The audio for the dialogue was also recorded simultaneously by phone, then processed with Adobe Podcast AI. The music is an AI creation, made with AIVA. Directed by Maggy Fellman & Eki Halkka Edited By Eki Halkka

...and that pretty much tells most of the story. In addition to the year's worth of posts here explaining and documenting the process, of course.

This most definitely was a case where the journey was more important than the goal - though gotta say, I'm really happy with how our little experiment turned out in the end. I would have dived into AI stuff regardless, but working on this project was a much better learning experience than just randomly dabbling around would have been - there was a method to the madness, an actual goal towards which to push the learning curve - all in a safe setting where a failure would not have been the end of the world (unlike in, err, so-called "real paid projects", where every work-hour needs to add real value to the client, or they'll find someone else).

Overall... really glad we did it. Kudos to Maggy for being Naggy, and pushing me forward.

CU

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Eki

CONDOMS come in handy: ask a CUBAN

Waterproof trinkets by Stable Diffusion

That cheap universal contraceptive is a multi-purpose tool for Cubans.  Kids use them for slingshots and party balloons. Fishermen use them for floats. Women tie up their ponytails.  Chevie owners lubricate them to shine the dashboards.

Bar-hoppers fill them with rum when they so they only have to buy one drink. Vintners use them as stoppers on giant glass wine bottles - when the condoms are erect the carbon dioxide is evaporating; when they go limp the wine is ready to drink. Brilliant. Inspired, I filled one with water and dumped it from my balcony on a bunch of loud out-of-tune crooners. Condom revenge.

Subsidized by the Communist government, condoms are cheap – 10 pesos (four cents) for a package of three. Most are made in India and users complain that they have a bad smell. A good gift when you visit Cuba is to bring them as gifts. Hats off to the CUBANS.

Source: The Economist

Next week: A bunch of AI:s & Eki pull it off 

A submerged vocalist by Midjourney & Eki

Note: 

Here in Finland, the one-size-fits-all solution for all your life hacking needs is not condoms, but rather... pantyhose. It's a long-lasting tradition that the Niksi-Pirkka magazine publishes new creative uses for pantyhose in its user-submitted tips and tricks column. Over the decades, there must be hundreds now, if not thousands. Here's a Google translation of some select ones.

As for the creative uses of condoms, they're good for waterproofing gear. Microphones do not like water, and it's a well-known trick to put the mic in a condom if you need to submerge it to record some scuba action. Or just to protect it from rain etc.

Finally - of course - I had to ask ChatGPT for some creative life-hack uses for condoms. 

1. Waterproofing your phone or other electronics.
2. Protecting a cast or bandage during showering or swimming.
3. Storing and preserving small items, such as matches or USB drives, in a waterproof and airtight container.
4. Stretching over the top of a can or jar to create a tight seal and prevent spills or leaks.
5. Using as a makeshift rubber band or hair tie.
6. Slipping over a microphone to protect it from wind or moisture.
7. Covering a wound or blister to keep it clean and dry.
8. Holding ice or cold packs in place for first aid or pain relief.
9. Filling with water and freezing to create an improvised ice pack.
10. Using as a glove to protect hands during messy tasks, such as painting or cleaning.
11. Using as a grip enhancer for tools, sports equipment, or even pens and pencils.
12. Slipping over the end of a vacuum cleaner hose to create a makeshift dusting brush.
13. Covering the end of a shower head to create a rain-like water flow.
14. Filling with lotion or other fluids and sealing shut to create a portable travel-sized container.
15. Using as a protective cover for a bike seat or handlebars during rain or snow.
16. Stretching over a lightbulb to create a diffused lighting effect.
17. Covering the foot of a walker or cane to create a non-slip grip on smooth surfaces.
18. Using as a makeshift water balloon for impromptu outdoor games.
19. Filling with birdseed and hanging to create a DIY bird feeder.

My microphone trick got on the list - the others are pretty good too.

CU

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Eki