Spend a vision with me: April 2024

Many people still believe AI is a21st Century thing. It is not, it has been around since the 1950s (1), but current advances in storage and compute have given it new breath and started democratizing it.

Therefore it should come as no surprise that 20^th Century troubadour-philosophers have been informing us about what such technology could mean for us.

Have we been listening? These troubadour-philosophers do not communicate to us like the works of Plato/Aristotle that are unfortunately being pushed into colder storage to save costs. I came across one of these works on the radio recently, and got inspired to write this blog post. How many of you are familiar with these philosophical pieces?

Every Breath you take (Synchronicity) – The Police (1983)

Let’s start by something easy, and a song that many of us have heard, hummed, or even sung at a karaoke…

“Oh, can't you see
You belong to me?
How my poor heart aches
With every step you take”

The chorus of the song is probably what makes many people believe this is a love song, the singer is heart broken.

However, it is worth looking at the lyrics in more detail.

“Every breath you take
And every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
I'll be watching you”

The first verse shows watching basically every waking moment.

“Every single day
And every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay
I'll be watching you”

And the second verse shows it goes on day and night.

There is no escape.

Nowadays it’s not so difficult to achieve this given the digital traces we leave everywhere, and the scary thing is that this has been happening, even in Singapore; true to the song someone searched his girlfriend in the police databases (2) However this is not an isolated incident, for example searching for details of his mistress (well the song could be about a mistress too, right?)(3) and there are many other, less romantic reasons for searching databases for individuals’ data (4)(5).

You will notice that these issues have occurred in different years.

I am not picking on the SPF, it’s just that

The cases regarding the Singapore Police Force on jealousy, surveillance, even ownership causing abuse of powers regarding data are

Not limited to the police force, it’s ironical (or prescient) because of the name of the band (6)(7)
not the only ones that have occurred, just a sample of those that made it to court and mainstream papers

My main point is that our data exists in so many places that the lyrics of the song can be taken literally.

Another thing to bear in mind is that in all these cases, the people who accessed the data actually had the privilege to do so, and they abused that privilege.

As a side not, I always tend to ask for all identifying information to be stripped off or the data anonymised before I work on any analysis/model. I think it is good practice.

The real question is whether enough is being done to prevent such abuses. And given that they keep occurring, the answer is no.

As more and more data is being captured about us, with more and more cameras being placed all over and technologies like facial recognition make it easy to identify and track individuals.

The singer, Sting in 1983 mentioned “I think it’s a nasty little song, really rather evil. It’s about jealousy and surveillance and ownership,”(8).

I wonder what he’d say nowadays. He did warn us about surveillance and ownership.

While The Police warned about what can happen at an individual level, someone else was already singing about a system designed to work at a larger scale.

Eye in the Sky (Eye in the Sky) – The Alan Parsons Project (1982)

This is another song many of us have hummed, “Eye in the sky, looking at you, I can read your mind…”

Casinos were some of the 1^st people to really look into analytics and human behaviour, going as far as designing the whole outlay of casinos, not only with FengShui (9) but also human minds in place. And that was what Alan Parsons project had written about.

But it is worth going into more details of the lyrics.

Many of us are familiar with the chorus (10) that starts:
“I am the eye in the sky
Looking at you
I can read your mind”

The idea is that surveillance is not just watching but has a predictive element “I can read your mind”. That was in 1982. And it goes even deeper:

“I am the maker of rules
Dealing with fools
I can cheat you blind”

Those who conduct the surveillance and the predictive analysis also make rules we have to obey, as fools. And since they are in control, they can cheat us if they choose to, so we better behave accordingly.

And the third part of the chorus:

“And I don't need to see any more to know that
I can read your mind (looking at you)
I can read your mind (looking at you)
I can read your mind (looking at you)
I can read your mind”

The information gathered is sufficient to predict what we do, what we are…

And they make it very clear in the 3^rd verse that the system is not something you can easily beat, it is futile to resist:

“Don't leave false illusions behind
…

Cause I ain't gonna live anymore believing
Some of the lies while all of the signs are deceiving”

Although the song goes quite dark, it also, earlier tried to use the carrot rather than the stick:

“Don't say words you're gonna regret
Don't let the fire rush to your head
I've heard the accusation before
And I ain't gonna take any more
Believe me
The sun in your eyes
Made some of the lies worth believing”

This is very true today where whatever we publish (this included) is captured ‘forever’ and can come to bite you in your behind, “Don’t say words you’re gonna regret”. But the ending of this verse is an encouragement to believe the lie “The sun on your eyes made some of the lies worth believing”, if we choose to, we can live contentedly.

Recently I was at a neighbourhood shop queuing for soya bean curd. A boy came in with his father and was looking around the shop. He was pointing out the cameras and counting them. I will ashamedly admit I had not paid attention.

Quick question, which city do you think has the most cctv cameras per sq km?

If you guessed Beijing or any city in China, you’d be wrong.

Chennai in India has the highest number of cctv cameras per sqkm, 657 (11), more than twice that of Beijing.

Anyway, back to the song… I feel that the song is a warning about surveillance and all that goes with it. That applies ot the whole album. Don’t take my word for it, their website says so too (12)

“The concept behind this album was related to belief systems, whether they be religious beliefs, political beliefs or belief in luck (as in gambling). Generally the concept is related to the universal idea that there is someone looking down on us all. The expression is also used in military and surveillance contexts.”

The Alan Parsons Project was direct about surveillance and hinted at how we probably could live an easier life if we complied to the rules.

But in true metal fantasy fashion, Ronnie James Dio sang about not bowing to the system while describing it very aptly, in 1992.

Computer God (Dehumanizer) – Black Sabbath (1992)

In 1992, Black Sabbath came up with the album dehumanizer, and the most relevant song for today’s theme is “Computer God”(13). You can find the full lyrics here (14).

The first verse itself contains the lyrics:

“Waiting for the revolution
New clear vision - genocide
Computerize god - it's the new religion
Program the brain - not the heartbeat”

The first verse, in a nutshell warns about the unstoppable march of technology. We have seen how technology is being used today (2024) to choose targets and ‘help’ decide their fate (15). The song eventually pushes to the risk of genocide of the human race.

Black Sabbath foresaw the unstoppable influence of technology, almost becoming a religion, and plead that the computers should help the brain, not the heart, because the heart is what makes us human. Perfect fit for the theme ‘Dehumanizer’.

The bridge (by the way illustrates the amazing talent of RJD) seems to hint at our addiction to social media and the effects it can have on us:

“Midnight confessions
Never heal the soul
What you believe is fantasy”

Many of us are attached to our devices at midnight, but is what is portrayed on social media real or fantasy? Is is just a way to learn about us to control us? Social media behaviour is also being used to identify people with certain traits and action is being taken (16)

“Your past is your future
Left behind
Lost in time
Will you surrender”

The next 4 lines hint at prediction, where your actions in the past, all of them, including those on social media (midnight confessions and the fantasy) are used to control your future since everything is calculated. Planned, and you just follow the recommendations that are fed to you while on social media (literally what your feed is calculated to be) or the ads, recommendations based on your profile that are shown to you. The question is “will you surrender”?

I, of course, am guilty of helping people surrender. When a ‘data scientist’, or ‘AI’ decides what offer to make you, and you pick it up, it counts as a success and reinforces the machine and directs what you will see next, you are being learned, your brain is being ‘programmed’ in a way. Are you being helped, or controlled? There is a thin line there, has it been crossed? Remember, this warning came more than 30 years ago.

The song ends on a grim note, warning us to think about what it is that makes us human (again, the album’s theme), and whether this is at risk:

“Virtual existence
With a superhuman mind
The ultimate creation
Destroyer of mankind”

It sounds a lot like “The Matrix” trilogy (17) but preceded it by 7 years.

Would you prefer the blue pill or the red pill?

Conclusion

The nice thing is that people have been thinking of and anticipating changes that advancing technology could bring to our society and the way we live. We are at a stage where the works of these people are all around us, we have been exposed to them. Have we been listening or just hearing?

Like many things in life, it is up to each individual to decide. Hopefully each of us first of all is aware of the choice, and at some point makes it.

Recently we have seen a few walk-backs, tail-between legs moments in the field of applications of ML/AI; the most interesting one from my point of view is Amazon stopping its ‘just walk out’ from its grocery stores (1). The reason I find it interesting is that behind all the tech, there were a thousand people checking the purchases (2). Hands up if you thought that it was all done by machines…

However, I will give credit where it is due, the ability to just walk out of a store after shopping, knowing that your purchases have been accurately tracked and the correct amount deducted from your accounts is a pretty useful feature. (3) It saves the consumer an appreciable amount of time and effort, and presumable at low to no cost especially if was truly automated)

And to me, analytics/ML/AI ‘s main aim should be to make people’s lives easier. Saving time and low to no cost while shopping is a good thing.

With this as context, I am sure you will understand my exasperation at HDB and ST Engineering(*).

HDB is using AI to detect power failures (4) – as if these occur frequently in Singapore…. ST Engineering even wants to sell its AI capabilities, even actionable intelligence (5)

However, to me, the basic functions the organisations are hired to do have to be done properly first, it’s like the Maslow hierarchy of needs (6), start by getting the basic needs right first. And this does not only mean the snazzy jazzy AI stuff, but the whole implementation process.

One of the HDB carparks we use very often is near a Sheng Siong Supermarket Coffee Shop + sundry shop… a very well utilized area within a block of HDB flats. The carpark of this area is managed by ST Engineering.

And the car park system has been erratic for a long while, at least 6 months now. You can tell who is a regular user of the car park because they give the car near the gantry enough space to reverse, reposition a few times to try and get the sensors to detect the vehicle (7). My question is, how is it possible that with their tools at their disposal, ST Engineering has not detected issues with this gantry? I am not even talking preventive maintenance, I am talking about usage being affected… That’s even more basic.

To add to this, I have a very specific incident.

It was raining very heavily when we were trying to exit the carpark, and the barriers simply wouldn’t go up. I exited the vehicle to press for attention from a human (ST Engineering, I assume has a number of people who can deal with the situation). The moment connection was made, it was cut-off; basically the human hung up. Twice. While I was getting drenched.

I called the helpline once we managed to get out of the car park (thank you to the people queuing for their patience, and the closest vehicle knowing to leave large room for maneuvering.) All I got was basically the communication is spoilt, we will fix it. I asked for written feedback, gave my email address, and noting came from ST Engineering. To me sounds like the case was not even lodged and there may have been covering for a colleague.

The point is, with simple use of Analytics,

the faulty gantry should have been detected earlier, rather than wait for complaints
there should be an automated system to ensure cases and raised and closed with SLAs, and this should be tracked automatically. Again, this is simple using today’s tools.

To me ST Engineering has failed in analytics and process, and in customer care.

How about HDB you ask?

Well, HDB outsourced the management of the carpark to ST engineering. Do they have customer satisfaction reports from ST Engineering, or do they not care? They must be happy with ST Engineering reports and performance – although I doubt the contract involves more than $. But also the design of the car park is bad. I got drenched attempting to communicate with the human managing gantry issues. A couple of metres from the gantry is a nicely covered walkway. I would think that extending the coverage to the gantry would not have costed that much. But hey, who cares?

What I am saying is very simple, before you start talking of GenAI, make sure you have the basic right, take care of Maslow’s hygiene and safety issues before you go for you own self-actualisation. After all, while HDB has a virtual monopoly on parking, customers should matter, don’t you think?

Conclusion

Build useful analytics, useful to the your users, make sure your KPIs reflect that, and build them into contracts. On the contractor side, track and analyse your true performance continuously. It is not rocket science, but still so many organisations fail at making lives of their stakeholders easier. Although, it would seem HDB/contractors are focused on maximizing revenue, investing in punishing rather than delivering good service (8)(9).

https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/2/24119199/amazon-just-walk-out-cashierless-checkout-ending-dash-carts
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-04-03/the-humans-behind-amazon-s-just-walk-out-technology-are-all-over-ai
this is a very different experience from NTUC supermarket self-checkout, but hat’s for another day
https://sbr.com.sg/telecom-internet/news/hdb-eyes-ai-powered-energy-system-in-tengah
https://www.stengg.com/en/digital-tech/data-science-analytics-and-ai/
https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html
Each vehicle in SG has an IU (In-vehicle Unit) and when you get into a car park, the IU number is read, the gantry opens, and upon exit the IU number is read, the time and relevant fee calculated and deducted from your cashcard within the IU, and the gantry opens.
https://blackdotresearch.sg/secret-devices-installed-in-hdb-car-park-gantries-to-catch-tailgaters/
https://tnp.straitstimes.com/news/singapore/hdb-crack-down-carpark-fee-evaders

* HDB is the Housing Development Board, a government agency responsible for public housing in Singapore, around 77% of residents live in HDB flats. ST Engineering is a government linked entity specialising in aerospace, electronics, land systems and marine sectors.

Spend a vision with me

Sunday, 28 April 2024

Songs about AI: Have we been listening or mindlessly humming/headbanging...?

Wednesday, 17 April 2024

ML/(Gen)AI: get the basics right, unless all you want to do is brag or punish