Drones and Regulation

All the signs are there that this is going to be a breakthrough year for drones when it comes to bursting into the public consciousness.

The Federal Aviation Authority in the U.S. was expected to bring out regulations on drones in December but it appears that they might be struggling with some of the complexities. As it stands at present, there is a general ban on commercial drone flight in the U.S. (subject to certain strict exemptions). It is believed that the new regulations will restrict drones weighing under 55 lbs to flying no higher than 400 feet, only during daylight hours and staying in sight of their operators (who may also be required to get pilot’s licences).

In the UK, it’s slightly different. The Civil Aviation Authority restricts flights for drones weighing over 20kg (44 lbs) and they are certainly viewed as aircraft, as opposed to simply the preserve of hobbyists.

I was listening to the Exponent podcast recently to a fascinating discussion around some of the regulatory pressures that will inevitably build up around this young technology. Let’s dig in to a few of the issues.

If we start with the risks, you don’t have to think too hard to come up with some challenges that the industry, and more widely, society will have to address. Put simply, the opportunity for misuse is significant. Drones represent the physical manifestation of a person’s intentions – and in this way, they fundamentally alter the existing equation that broadly says, if you wish to do harm to someone, you will have to put yourself into harm’s way. There is almost nothing that can be done to prevent an individual who is willing to give up his or her life in order to carry out a suicide bombing, for example – yet arguably with drones, the barriers to carrying to same actions out become lower, potentially opening the activity up to a far wider pool of motivated individuals. It’s far easier to sacrifice the ‘life’ of your £1,000 drone  instead.

Some examples: drones spotted flying over nuclear power plants in France, the recent drone flying a flag over a racially-charged football match and the recent arrest in the U.S. of an individual who boasted of his intent to load up a drone with a bomb and to then fly this drone into a school.

Drones also change the equation when it comes to the targeting of high value assets – in other words, assassination attempts. Yes, it’s conceivable that the police or military could – if they were lucky – shoot down a drone carrying a grenade that’s flying, perhaps at speeds upwards of 60 mph, towards a politician. But if there were five? Ten? No chance.

By removing the presence of a human from an equation and introducing a technology that could also conceivably be pre-programmed, there is even the prospect of one individual leaving drones around the country and carrying out a co-ordinated, simultaneous attack in a number of cities in the future.

So that’s the terrorist angle. You have to also factor in unbalanced individuals, before you can even get to the hobbyists who just make a mistake. Flying a drone too close to the engine of a descending aircraft to get a good video and bringing the plane down would certainly fall into this category but there are many others that you could imagine. And then, last but certainly not least, there’s the privacy aspect. If drone usage becomes far more widespread and you end up with them buzzing outside bedroom windows, it’s not hard to imagine some form of retribution being dished out (justified or not) .

With that huge list of potential doomsday scenarios seemingly just around the corner, surely the answer is to regulate heavily – or indeed to introduce a total ban?

Although it’s far from clear cut, I can’t believe that that’s the right way to go – for a number of reasons. In this case, I have a lot of sympathy for the argument that says the only people who will follow such regulations are the ‘good’ people – the so-called ‘bad’ people aren’t the ones that will be checking sub-section 54(7)c of the legislation before carrying out a terrorist attack. So – in the absence of a complete ban, in which case all drones can be shot down out of the sky on sight – what good is regulation really going to do?

One of the reasons that technology is so valuable is because when you have advancements in something that can be replicated repeatedly and in significant numbers, it has by definition the potential to drive massive disruption throughout society. This invariably brings challenges but it’s critically important to be able to separate genuine threats to health and society from the resistance that comes from incumbent powers-that-be who want to protect the status quo. I see so many parallels with what is happening with Bitcoin/Blockchain innovations here – even although there is no specific incumbent being displaced by these drones as such. Perhaps we are simply entering into an age where air logistics are being decentralised.

It’s a common (and often truthful) criticism of technologists that they are too optimistic about the future. Yet there are a couple of key points here. In exactly the same way as any other technological innovation, from the motor car to the blockchain, once the invention happens, the cat is out of the bag. That toothpaste ain’t going back in that tube no matter how hard you might try.

But the second point is, I believe, critical when it comes to innovation. When a technology is invented, it is often far easier to focus on negative use-cases – because you are using existing reality as your reference point. A reality that, by definition, is about to be disrupted as a result. The true value of innovations usually comes in use-cases that have not yet been imagined. There is an inevitable time lag before people’s individual concepts and mental models evolve to reflect such breakthroughs. At the moment (similar again to Bitcoin), there’s an assumption that the value is only there for hobbyists and early adopters – what possible use could you have for a drone unless you’re simply having a laugh (in which case, let’s regulate for safety) or intending to break, or stretch, the law (in which case, let’s regulate for protection). Yet think of how different that conversation inevitably becomes once the population has grown to expect first response emergency healthcare to be delivered by drones, for example.

Now I’m not saying that zero regulation is the way forward. It’s a complex and nuanced topic. Protections no doubt will be required and I’m certain that a reasoned and open discussion at this point will be far more valuable than in the future in the immediate aftermath of a high profile drone incident. However it’s important to adopt a balanced approach (don’t stifle the innovation that has yet to take place).

I’d love to know your thoughts on this – please leave a comment if you have a view. There’s no doubt that opening up the discussion further on these sorts of topics is crucial to the debate. And that’s why I’m happy that this year looks like being the breakout year for drones.

Jibo And The Social Robotics Revolution

I’ve written about my soft spot for robots before but it feels like it’s time to return to the topic again. A few months ago I went along to the opening of the new Edinburgh Centre for Robotics and the message was clear – like it or not, autonomous systems are coming.

However I’ve not written before about social robotics. If you have no idea what that term means, I recommend watching this excellent talk by Cynthia Breazeal (transcript here).

Breazeal is a true innovator in her field. She supposedly had a flash of inspiration back in 1997 when the first robotic explorer rolled onto the surface of Mars (a device whose development she had influenced) and realised that whilst we were focused on using robots to explore the outer reaches of both the earth and space, we were making very little headway in bringing robots into the home.

Pioneering research into the effect of robots, some of the results have been intriguing. Put simply, the more able the machine is to identify, mimic and respond to standard human non-verbal cues, the greater the degree of empathy – and consequently value – there is with the humans present.

As you’ll see in that talk, it’s fascinating to think of the potential for developing such technologies that take account of the multitude of social clues and inputs in such a way that remote grandparents to play with grandchildren in real time as if they were in the same room. Similarly, if the robot’s purpose is to help you to stick to a fitness regime, the more lifelike it becomes, the evidence shows that the more positive the impact it will have on your life.

After a lifetime of research and improving in each project that she’s undertaken, Breazeal has now taken a leave of absence from MIT where she was teaching to launch a new robot for the home.

Meet Jibo.

There’s a real buzz building around Jibo following an oversubscribed Indiegogo crowd funding campaign ($2.2 million raised on a $100K goal). There’s no doubt that part of this is down to the fact that Breazeal is a leading light when it comes to bringing robots into the home, with Forbes asking whether she might be the Steve Wozniak of robots. However, the main reason is because Jibo in fact represents a platform upon which others can develop software (think apps for robots).

As with any new fields of technology, there’s will be risks here that have to be addressed as Jibo and its descendants start to make their way into the kitchens – and other rooms – of our houses.

As with any device connected to the Internet, there are the usual security/hacking risks. These may be heightened by the fact that any robot that is able to accurately mimic real human responses may, in the wrong hands, be capable of manipulating owners (economically or in other ways). Or another example is that a robot could be instructed to pick up a house key and push it through a cat flap for a potential (presumably pretty high-tech) burglar to let himself in. It’s an issue that Jibo avoids entirely by having no means to grab objects (or indeed move around the room – interesting when you see the evidence that shows that humans’ empathy for robots tends to increase in line with the extent to which they can move).

There’s also an interesting question to be answered around how ever-present personal robots could mark the end of genuine solitude, particularly given the fact that people self-modify behaviour automatically when they believe that they are being observed.

It’s very early days but I have a really good feeling about Jibo being successful when it finally ships later this year. I think it will be successful as a consumer ‘family’ robot, a sector that can only get more crowded in the coming years. The design is brilliantly simple, neatly avoiding that uncanny valley issue entirely from attempting to be too humanoid and it has a real chance of kicks tarting that social robotics revolution that we’ve all grown up reading about or watching in popular films no matter what age group we belong to.

Steel Mill Hacked And Damaged

As we see the Internet of Things really take off over the next few years, the added benefits that we’ll all be able to enjoy – whether that means intelligent home heating saving us money whilst keeping us warm or relying on a fridge to pick the cheapest milk to be delivered to our doorstep – will be huge.

Yet such advances also come with some real problems that will need addressing urgently. The first relates to digital identity. If I have 100 devices that are all intelligently transacting on my behalf, how will they know that I am indeed who I claim to be when telling them to stop?

However the second is no less important and relates to the fact that as the importance of the devices that are connected to the internet increases (whether cumulatively or individually as more parts of significant ‘things’ are brought online), the potential attack vectors from a security perspective will go through the roof.

It’s starting already. At the end of 2014, a report was released that explained how a German steel mill had been damaged by hackers who had broken into the system and prevented a steel furnace from being shut off. Cue “massive damage”.

The stakes are certainly getting higher. It looks very likely that America carried out a state-directed cyber-attack only a couple of weeks ago when North Korea was disconnected from the Internet. But interestingly it appears as if there’s only been one previous example of a hacker causing actual physical damage on the ground. You may remember Stuxnet, designed by the U.S.and Israel to damage centrifuges in Iran’s nuclear plants, which they did very successfully.

It seems like a great time to be a security expert.

Why Art Is Just As Important As Science

“Science makes the world easier to live in. But it’s art that makes the world worth living in.”

I’ve heard this comment (or a variation of it) a number of times over the past few years and it’s one I find myself returning to more frequently these days. Art and science have historically been viewed, for the most part, as distinct subjects. Yet when you start to look into it more closely, the reality is that incredible things tend to happen when the fields of science and art merge.

In fact, despite assumptions that the two are almost polar opposites, neither field has strictly defined boundaries in practice. However, within our education systems, we tend to view the pursuit of scientific learning as having greater value. I remember being told once by a friend that in school, science is taught – but art is (merely) allowed.

The reality is that at the intersection of both fields, science and art are able to influence and shape each other in incredible and valuable ways. Many people are well aware of the continual push to encourage students to take STEM subjects. But even whilst the issue of getting students involved in such areas is being addressed, another group are pushing further still, looking for such support to be expanded to the wider STEAM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Maths).

The argument goes that in teaching  STEM subjects, students are working towards solutions that are already known. In many ways, science seeks to provide answers to question. Yet it is art that asks such questions in the first place. And it is precisely this innovative and creativity that is so crucial.

Interestingly, the evidence shows that some of the greatest thinkers have embraced creative disciplines – think of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. By bringing together knowledge from a variety of areas, advances are made. Evidence shows that Nobel laureates from the Sciences are 17 times more likely than the average scientist to be a painter, 12 times as likely to be a poet and 4 x as likely to be a musician.

And in today’s environment, this becomes even more important. As quick examples, think about how data is increasingly being visualised by talented information designers, the growth of 3D printing in art and the reinvention of music with technology. And there’s an argument that with each of us now having access to a vast network of shared knowledge online, we are all gradually becoming polymaths of a sort.

There’s a big reason Jonny Ive’s Apple was so massively successful and it wasn’t down to Steve Jobs alone. But of course it goes both ways. It would be impossible to deny that the art of photography, for example, has developed significantly with the impact of technology. And speak to any programmer and they will hold up the finest code as exhibiting similar levels of creativity as some of the finest classical works.

Specialisation within a closed ecosystem cannot possibly provide such valuable results as an open, inclusive network that actively promotes input from all directions. For this reason alone, it’s vital that we continue to support the development of those within the creative/arts sector as we move forwards into a world that is becoming increasingly dependent on technology.

I’ll wrap up with a TED talk from Mae Jemison back in 2002.

Postmodern Computing and the Blockchain

Post-modernism, according to Wikipedia, was “a movement that represented a departure from modernism”. Useful. So what’s modernism? One definition explains it as “modern thought, character or practice”.

Strange start to today’s blog post you might think. But bear with me.

I read an awesome article today by Mike Loukides which provides much of the context here. You should take a moment now to go and read it. In it, he discusses hearing the phrase “postmodern computing” for the first time back in the summer of 2014 and then proceeds to explain why the words provide a valuable perspective that needs to be considered when observing developments within the computing industry (if indeed you can call something so varied and distributed a single industry any longer – which is kind of the point).

In the arts, modernism was (broadly speaking) the view that times had changed and that it was necessary to move away from tradition in order to reflect the rapid evolution in the social and economic environment. The movement was defined by a form of honest yet naive faith of some sorts, a belief that the future would inevitably be better as a result of the cumulative effect of many advances, particularly across the fields of science and the arts.

But it was followed by post-modernism which in many ways represented the death of such optimism as the realisation grew that some form of techno-utopia was not, in fact, just around the corner. Progress was not universally and equally distributed across all people in the way that so many had hoped With the advances  that facilitated online cooperation on a global scale came difficulties that to us now seem obvious in retrospect.

As Loukides points out, the same technological leap forward in the realm of online communication that enabled the Arab Spring has been used as a tool of harassment by many, the benefits of online commerce negated by the damage caused by online fraud and the sharing of personal details with loved ones across social platforms has also provided the information that is oxygen for the surveillance state that we now inhabit.

So as the picture tarnishes, what are some of the themes that will run through this new era of postmodern computing?

Clearly peer-to-peer computing will play a significant role. And it’s here that Bitcoin provides us with a crucial innovation. Not for the currency, but for the blockchain itself. As Loukides so nicely puts it:-

“The blockchain is a technology for verifying transactions in the absence of trust. I’d go even further: it’s a verification technology that works even if everyone participating is someone you distrust. Why should I trust a Bitcoin miner, whose primary incentive is to get rich quick? No reason at all: the genius of the blockchain is that you don’t have to.”

It’s a great articulation of the real reason why there’s so much excitement around the so-called Bitcoin 2.0 projects within the community – and also why all those critics who have failed to spend any time understanding the scene are missing out on the oh-so-important bigger picture. All around the world, people are now working to build applications that tap into the blockchain’s ability to verify data in the absence of trust.

And when it comes to the widespread surveillance uncovered by Snowden, this new era of postmodern computing is likely to see individuals using such tools (as intended or modified) to protect themselves. For example, the Tor network has a very unusual dynamic – funded by US military for surveillance purposes to help obfuscate intelligence communications online (protecting spies in the field and suchlike), it’s now somewhere that half of the government is trying to infiltrate en route to unmasking criminals whilst the other half is trying hard to protect to maintain its effectiveness. Yet such technologies are increasingly being utilised defensively by individuals across the world (much to the consternation of governments).

Loukides’ final point is just as important. As we transition into the realism of this post-modern age, the traditional view of computing has finally become outdated. No longer can you realistically seek self-sufficiency. The reality is that with the distribution of computing power, we now have a vast cloud network utilising hardware that is controlled by third parties whose location we are unable to track definitively with ease. Reliance on others is now the most common reality.

I like articles that force me to step back and reconsider the bigger picture. And for me, this is the best this year.

Bitcoin: Women Wanted

I’m just back in from the first Scottish Bitcoin Meetup of 2015 where Marc Warne from Bittylicious gave a great talk on his experiences in running a UK Bitcoin business. With batteries now recharged and a timely catch up with a few folk in the scene, I’m now massively enthusiastic about the year ahead for Bitcoin in Scotland. We’ve already got plenty of talks and events in the pipeline and big plans to continue building out the community and ecosystem this year.

However, in the midst of all this planning, there’s one area in particular that has to be a key focus for me this year as an event organiser  – and that’s the gender disparity within the Bitcoin scene. Despite the fact that there are a few high-profile names, there can be no doubt that women are currently under-represented in Bitcoin, as Lui Smyth pointed out in presenting his research back at the Scottish Bitcoin Conference last year. To be clear, this is in no way exclusively a Scottish problem. But it is something that as a relatively small but fast-developing community, we have the opportunity – but more importantly also an obligation – to change.

In many ways, it’s little surprise that there’s an uneven gender mix when it comes to Bitcoiners, given the fact that the main feeder pools of interest (finance, technology, gamers, even arguably high-risk takers) tend to be dominated by males according to existing research. I’ll  go into my reasons behind this belief more fully in a future post but, as I mentioned in my talk at the Conference, I’m a strong supporter of the viewpoint that the involvement of women is crucial to Bitcoin’s success. We’re a long way from putting together a Women in Bitcoin group here at this stage in Scotland but personally I’d be delighted to see one take off.

So, for my part, I’ll do what I can to help. There are various female-focused tech groups within the Scottish startup and business scene and so far their response to suggested Bitcoin events for their members has been unanimously positive. Obviously if anyone reads this and would like to organise something along these lines also, please do get in touch as I’d be more than happy to help.

And I’m desperate to avoid putting on another conference with an all-male speaker list as I was forced to do last year.  That to me would represent failure on my part.

So – game on.

The Power of Distraction

I remember very few students had their own computers when I went to university back in 1993. If you want a laugh, just take a look at the internet in 1993 in this video.  I wonder how I’d approach the work if I was going through it all again today. Given that the first time around involved wasting time on things that are pointless now we have vast oceans of information online, I’m pretty sure I’d be if anything more reliant on technology than I am today. Although I’m delighted to have missed out on the ‘drunken-photos-on-Facebook’ stage…

Clay Shirky’s a guy who knows a thing or two about the internet. In addition to writing the influential “Here Comes Everybody: How Change Happens When People Come Together“, he’s also given a number of TED talks. So with that background, it’s worth taking notice when he writes an essay with the title ‘Why I Asked My Students To Put Their Laptops Away‘.

In a nutshell, Shirky has finally enforced a ban on technology use in his lessons – quite a turnaround for a guy who teaches students about the internet. However, he’s decided that the evidence finally stacks up to warrant it. That’s the research that shows that multi-tasking actually reduces efficiency and proves that there’s longer term cognitive damage that’s being caused by the continual instant gratification being served up via social media notifications.

“Worse, the designers of operating systems have every incentive to be arms dealers to the social media firms. Beeps and pings and pop-ups and icons, contemporary interfaces provide an extraordinary array of attention-getting devices, emphasis on “getting.” Humans are incapable of ignoring surprising new information in our visual field, an effect that is strongest when the visual cue is slightly above and beside the area we’re focusing on. (Does that sound like the upper-right corner of a screen near you?)”

On top of that, research has also shown that the damage is not restricted to the class Facebook addict. It’s been shown that the effect of one person’s multitasking on a laptop also damages the performance of others who are able to simply see the multitasking taking place. As Shirky says, it’s like somebody taking a boombox into the classroom.

The research goes a long way towards explaining the growth in demand for solutions that cut us off from technology and literature that encourages us to focus on a specific task at hand in any event. The assault on our productivity is being disguised by micro-hits of gratification, pushed by social networks that sustain us throughout the course of every day. Hard work still requires focus. But somehow, I suspect that we already knew that was the case.

Fred Wilson On 2014’s Key Themes

Fred Wilson put up a couple of posts around the turn of the year which are worth taking a look through. He starts by setting down some of the key themes that he saw during the course of the year and followed it up the next day with a few thoughts on what might be on the cards in 2015.

It’s worth reading the posts in full but if you want a quick summary, the key themes in 2014 were set out as being:-

I’m interested to see a big overlap between these themes and many of my posts here. I don’t for a second claim to have anything like the insight that Fred has into what’s going on but I think most people would agree that uncovering basic general trends is not rocket science per se. Where people like Fred excel is in being able to absorb all of this information, analyse it and then actually manage to pick a crop of companies for each fund to invest in from which the global “winners’ of each sector could ultimately emerge.

I wonder what will be beside the set of bulletpoints this time next year.

Bitcoin: Six Years Old Today

Six years ago today, someone using the pseudonym of Satoshi Nakamoto mined the Genesis Block and was rewarded with the first ever bitcoins. Embedded within the code was a headline taken from The Times that day. In the midst of a worsening financial crisis, Bitcoin had been launched as an experiment in provide an alternative to the current system which was proving itself to be fatally flawed.

Headline embedded in Genesis Block
Headline embedded in Genesis Block

Six years on and we have a nascent financial system that is rapidly filling up with some of the brightest thinkers from across a wide range of disciplines. During that time, we’ve seen little to no innovation within fiat systems around the world which remain moribund despite rescue attempts that have bordered on desperation at times. The result is that the world’s economy is in a worse place to deal with the next financial crisis than it was in 2007-2008.

Bitcoin isn’t perfect. Challenges remain. 2014 was arguably the most torrid year for Bitcoin so far in some respects. But the fundamental innovation that was introduced first in Satoshi’s White Paper before being made reality six years ago on January 3rd 2008 remains just as valuable today. And importantly, people are coming together around the world to try to reimagine a system that works in the modern day. Because there’s little doubt that the one we currently have is broken.

Happy Birthday Bitcoin. No doubt we’re in for another wild ride in 2015 but whatever happens, we’re learning and making progress. So please, over the next twelve months – bring your ideas and an open mind and get involved with the building.

Blipfoto Partners With Polaroid

Sometime back in 2008, I bumped into Joe Tree. He introduced me to Blipfoto, a website that he’d set up back in 2004 to record one photograph a day that he felt captured something worth remembering. Gradually, friends started asking him if they could join in. Word-of-mouth played its part and now the site was starting to take off around the world.

It was an important chat for me. I was a lawyer in those days but I was becoming increasingly frustrated by the constraints of my profession. Put simply, there just wasn’t enough tech and innovation to keep me interested. But now I saw something new. I might have been around lots of technology companies and founders over the years but in those days I’d never met anyone that was successfully building an online community organically – and certainly not from my hometown of Edinburgh.

If forced to, I would say that the one defining theme that underpins my interest in technology is that of networks – their formation, their value in bringing efficiency to the exchange of information and the way in which ‘real’ lives then adapt. And this was a golden opportunity to join a global network that had started in my own neck of the woods.

I joined the community and had a blast. There is something unique about only having the opportunity to upload a single photograph (with text, if you like) on a daily basis. That element of personal curation really turns the all-too-common over-sharing problem that plagues digital photography across social platforms on its head. It goes against the tide in a particularly positive way, giving users the opportunity to reach a level of insight about others’ lives that’s unusual which in turn has the positive effect of strengthening the bonds between community members.

So I was delighted to get an email this afternoon to say that Blipfoto has just entered into a partnership with Polaroid.

It’ll be fascinating to see how the relationship develops. As with any strong community, there will always be some who are resistant to change. That’s inevitable but I believe necessary here if the site is going to be “the place where the world tells its story”.

Polaroid is an iconic brand when judged on one metric in particular: public awareness. The inevitable outcome is that many more people will hear about – and therefore join – Blipfoto. It will be challenging to ensure that the community spirit remains. But knowing some of the people involved, if anyone’s able to do it, I think the team at Blipfoto can.