Seriously, where is the spring? (Credit: Lance Ulanoff)
Does the future know best?
I stumbled on this tweet from Dogecoin creator Shibetoshi Nakamoto. It shows an old robotics manual that says, “If no one comes from the future to stop you from doing it, then how bad can it be?”
At first, I laughed. It’s an oft-repeated time-travel movie trope where someone travels back in time to undo something that results in catastrophe in the future. Think Terminator 2 and you get the idea.
Then I thought about it some more and grew concerned. Imagine, for instance, if this is the thinking of climate deniers, those who think that what we’re doing to the planet right now is okay and worry little about how future generations will deal with rising temperatures, floods, and extreme weather. Hey, no one has time-traveled to tell us that we’re possibly destroying the world, it must be fine.
Nakamoto might be tongue-in-cheek thinking about cryptocurrency like his volatile Dogecoin. It’s a great investment now because no one has traveled back in time to tell us otherwise.
You could extend this maxim to any questionable decision you make right now. Eat carbs, fat, and sugar now because your fat self isn’t traveling back in time to stop you. Gamble in Vegas because your destitute future self hasn’t tapped you on the shoulder. Your friendless future self isn’t arriving to warn you about too much time spent on social media.
This is a slippery slope. I often think about how history is trying to whisper to us and tell us that there are lessons to learn from their mistakes. The future, though, has no voice beyond the one we give it right now.
Uber taxis
Uber has come a very long way since former CEO Travis Kalanick called taxi drivers “a-holes.”
Wherever the rideshare company went, it completely disrupted the existing taxi business. Negotiations to somehow accommodate the existing Medallion-based business in NYC, for instance, went nowhere.
Fast-forward 8 years and Uber will now include New York City Taxis in the Uber App along with existing cars. The move may be a bit self-serving, and the service has been suffering through a driver shortage. Plus, some Uber drivers might be less likely to drive further to pick up passengers because it could mean burning through more now-much-more-expensive gas.
I see this as progress but do wonder how it will work in the city. Will I be confused when a yellow taxi shows up as opposed to a black sedan with a little lit-up U on the dash? Not if the app shows me a yellow taxi is coming.
Wonder what Kalanick makes of this.
Security reminder
I opened Facebook the other day and noticed the little red alert on the Facebook Messenger icon. I don’t have a lot of close Facebook friends, relatives, and colleagues, and even fewer who will contact me via Facebook Messenger. So, I check it out. It was from an old high school friend and said:
“Look who died 😲”
My brain immediately spun through a virtual Rolodex of high school friends, some of which my dark brain was already burying. Without thinking, I clicked on the link. To view who died, I’d have to enter my Facebook username and password.
My emotional brain shut down and my analytical one took over and slapped me briskly across the face: Scam. My friend’s account was hacked.
I switched back to the message and wrote “You hacked?”
He replied some hours later, “Yes, already changed password and reported.”
This is just a reminder that there are few attacks more powerful and effective than social-engineering ones that play on your emotions.
I know what I’m doing, and they almost got me.
Be careful out there.
Stay safe
See you soon