The impending Age Of Abundance was prophecied in the scriptures thousands of years ago.
Showing posts with label Israel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Israel. Show all posts
Monday, November 25, 2024
Thursday, November 21, 2024
Tuesday, October 08, 2024
Wednesday, April 17, 2024
Friday, December 06, 2019
NEOM: A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity?
That NEOM is an attempt at a fundamental departure for all humanity is not my idea or suggestion. That is the stated goal from the people who have come up with the project. Within that suggestion, I am offering my ideas.
The idea is a new city can itself be as innovative as a new company. And if that city were to become home to many new companies on the cutting edges of innovation, then that city as innovation would be something remarkable. Frankly, unprecedented. That is not New York City, that is not Silicon Valley. When Manhattan was just an uninhabited island, when California was just wilderness, and what we know as Silicon Valley was just apple orchards. But none of those places started with the clarity of ambition that NEOM is projecting.
I find it exciting to even think about the whole project. I see myself getting involved at some point. I am certainly open to it.
NEOM: Governance
NEOM Beats Mars
NEOM: Wide Participation Will Enhance Chance Of Success
NEOM, Jerusalem: Twin Cities?
My Take On NEOM, The City
NEOM: A City
I want to think in terms of all the ways it could go right. But I would also like to think of ways it could go wrong. Better now than when the failures have already materialized.
The number one word of caution is that the spiritual foundation has to be the number one priority. When Noah was around the world was full of engineers performing all sorts of tricks. Without a sound spiritual foundation, engineering is just gloom and doom.
I appreciate Prince Salman's bold attempt to wrest the narrative in the Islamic world. If Prophet Muhammad's (PBUH) wife was what today would be considered a CEO, maybe women today should also be running things. During the golden era of Islam, the Islamic world exhibited an immense thirst for knowledge, the kind that nurtures math and science. He is trying to take the region to a modernity that already existed.
All major religions talk of God as the creator. If there is only one creation, how many Gods do you think there are, right? That one God is always going to be more and bigger than whatever you understand God to be. Because God is infinite, and the human being is finite. A human being can not hope to understand God, only God's revelations.
Saudi Arabia stands to benefit from the whole project. It came up with the idea, it is offering all that land, and it is coming up with the seed capital. It only makes sense that it will benefit from it. The ask is not that big. All Saudi Arabia is asking in return is to give itself a diversified economy, a post-oil economy. I think that is fair enough. And very possible.
But it should also stick by its stance to step back a little and allow many others to participate. This has to feel like a clean slate to many parties. There are people in Silicon Valley who fantasize about opening up tech startup office spaces on ships out in the international waters off the California coasts. Let them come to NEOM. The US voter is tired of paying the bills for being the world's policeman. Let them see the promise of NEOM. There are many countries angling to create a multi-polar world. Let them participate in NEOM.
NEOM can not be a place where expensive consultants give their bad advice and run for the hills when things go awry. It can not be a place only for tech wizardry. The innovation has to be on many levels. There has to be a solid spiritual foundation. There has to be political innovation. There has to be social innovation. There has to be law enforcement innovation. There has to be governance innovation. There has to be an urban living innovation. There has to be a tourism innovation.
This new city has to learn from the oldest inhabited cities of the world for they carry wisdom. The truly new borrows heavily from the truly old.
Saudi Arabia Is Betting Its Future on a Desert Megacity Foreign Policy: November 2017 Can Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious plans jumpstart social and economic reform, or are they an expensive miscalculation? ........ “Welcome to the future of Saudi Arabia,” a Saudi tour guide intoned last week as she led guests into a showroom advertising values not traditionally associated with the kingdom: gender equality, environmental sustainability, and technological innovation....... After an IMAX-style introductory video, the first stop on this “megaprojects tour” was a model of one of three new futuristic cities that Saudi Arabia is set to break ground on next year, dubbed Qiddiya. Located 25 miles from the capital, Riyadh, the city is envisioned as an entertainment megaplex with everything from indoor ski slopes to roller coasters to a zoo. Guests on the preview tour could interact with a holographic lion or try out the mountain bike and race car simulators. Down the hall were previews of the second two cities, a Red Sea tourist resort and Neom, a tech hub that aims to have more robots than humans in its population. ........ The cities are part of Vision 2030, the kingdom’s ambitious plan to pivot the economy away from oil. The program was announced over a year ago, but the event, which ran from Oct. 24 to Oct. 26, was the “coming out” party — a chance for the global financial elite to see for themselves whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was, in the words of one investor, “for real.” The so-called Future Investment Initiative (FII) pulled in 3,500 attendees, including dozens of blue-chip executives. Crew members from the Saudi national airline helped guide potential investors through the hallways of the Ritz Carlton. Robot “concierges” stood outside panel rooms, playfully soliciting interaction and selfies. ........... The message was clear to all: For three decades, the state has worked assiduously to avoid offending the conservative religious elite, stalling the trappings of modernity that have catapulted development in cities such as neighboring Dubai. This conference was meant to seal that chapter and set out a new, aspirational end point. ....... “Before now, the government always made a balance between the liberal people and the conservatives. They gave this side something, [that] faction another thing,” said Amal al-Hazzani, a columnist at Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat and professor at King Saud University. “They kept trying to make that balance, until Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman came.… [H]e ended that era.” ........ Mohammed bin Salman is signaling to Saudis that they are embarking on a momentous reform project from which there is no turning back. Saudi Arabia will need a serious shaking up to bring its economic and social structure into the 21st century. ....... “Seventy percent of the Saudi people are less than 30 years old, and we will not waste 30 years of our lives dealing with extremist ideas — we will destroy them today,” Mohammed bin Salman told the gathering. “We want to live a normal life.” ........ Many conference attendees likely didn’t realize just how revolutionary certain aspects of last week’s event were. Bankers from London to Lagos enjoyed gender-mixed coffee breaks, where women weren’t required to wear the traditional abaya. There were no intermissions for prayers, which shut down Saudi businesses for 30 minutes multiple times a day. Only a handful of speeches began with the usual Islamic prayer. ......... ...Saudi Arabia’s urban dreams are almost absurdly large, and Mohammed bin Salman has been intimately involved in forming them. He first pitched the idea of building completely new cities in 2015, just after his father was elevated as king, and has since signed off on details — even down to the logo designs........ Neom, the centerpiece of the mega projects, will cover more than 10,000 square miles — 10 times the size of Luxembourg. An initial press release described the city as “the safest, most efficient, most future-oriented, and best place to live and work” in the world....... Every piece of life in Neom will be linked to artificial intelligence: roads and cars will adjust to avoid traffic, and grocery orders will be fed directly to drone delivery units. Hydroponic growers will farm produce without soil, utilizing electricity produced by solar panels........ The city aims to attract top tech talent from across the globe, incentivizing businesses to flock to Neom through preferential regulation. Social life and gender norms will be drawn from “global best practices,” a term that serves as the default answer to any question about how something in the city — whether transport or official language — will work.......... Mohammed bin Salman’s personal support and the emphasis on good regulations was “very reassuring. It’s also something that we didn’t hear in the last three decades.”...... State-led plans such as Neom often miss the organic, bottom-up tech ecosystem that breeds innovation. Meanwhile, the Gulf cities that Neom hopes to rival — Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and even Doha — have a decade-plus head start......... Watching corrupt ministers face charges, incompetent consultants lose their jobs, and longtime undersecretaries demoted is starting to change the work culture. Fatani says the new ethos is, “Just get it done.” ............ Mohammed bin Salman will surely need to remain mindful of simmering conservative frustrations. The very bureaucrats he aims to reform may also push back, quietly delaying projects, sitting on approvals, or just heading home from work early. The stagnating price of oil, skepticism from investors, or regional instability could also set progress back.
The idea is a new city can itself be as innovative as a new company. And if that city were to become home to many new companies on the cutting edges of innovation, then that city as innovation would be something remarkable. Frankly, unprecedented. That is not New York City, that is not Silicon Valley. When Manhattan was just an uninhabited island, when California was just wilderness, and what we know as Silicon Valley was just apple orchards. But none of those places started with the clarity of ambition that NEOM is projecting.
I find it exciting to even think about the whole project. I see myself getting involved at some point. I am certainly open to it.
NEOM: Governance
NEOM Beats Mars
NEOM: Wide Participation Will Enhance Chance Of Success
NEOM, Jerusalem: Twin Cities?
My Take On NEOM, The City
NEOM: A City
I want to think in terms of all the ways it could go right. But I would also like to think of ways it could go wrong. Better now than when the failures have already materialized.
The number one word of caution is that the spiritual foundation has to be the number one priority. When Noah was around the world was full of engineers performing all sorts of tricks. Without a sound spiritual foundation, engineering is just gloom and doom.
I appreciate Prince Salman's bold attempt to wrest the narrative in the Islamic world. If Prophet Muhammad's (PBUH) wife was what today would be considered a CEO, maybe women today should also be running things. During the golden era of Islam, the Islamic world exhibited an immense thirst for knowledge, the kind that nurtures math and science. He is trying to take the region to a modernity that already existed.
All major religions talk of God as the creator. If there is only one creation, how many Gods do you think there are, right? That one God is always going to be more and bigger than whatever you understand God to be. Because God is infinite, and the human being is finite. A human being can not hope to understand God, only God's revelations.
Saudi Arabia stands to benefit from the whole project. It came up with the idea, it is offering all that land, and it is coming up with the seed capital. It only makes sense that it will benefit from it. The ask is not that big. All Saudi Arabia is asking in return is to give itself a diversified economy, a post-oil economy. I think that is fair enough. And very possible.
But it should also stick by its stance to step back a little and allow many others to participate. This has to feel like a clean slate to many parties. There are people in Silicon Valley who fantasize about opening up tech startup office spaces on ships out in the international waters off the California coasts. Let them come to NEOM. The US voter is tired of paying the bills for being the world's policeman. Let them see the promise of NEOM. There are many countries angling to create a multi-polar world. Let them participate in NEOM.
NEOM can not be a place where expensive consultants give their bad advice and run for the hills when things go awry. It can not be a place only for tech wizardry. The innovation has to be on many levels. There has to be a solid spiritual foundation. There has to be political innovation. There has to be social innovation. There has to be law enforcement innovation. There has to be governance innovation. There has to be an urban living innovation. There has to be a tourism innovation.
This new city has to learn from the oldest inhabited cities of the world for they carry wisdom. The truly new borrows heavily from the truly old.
Saudi Arabia Is Betting Its Future on a Desert Megacity Foreign Policy: November 2017 Can Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious plans jumpstart social and economic reform, or are they an expensive miscalculation? ........ “Welcome to the future of Saudi Arabia,” a Saudi tour guide intoned last week as she led guests into a showroom advertising values not traditionally associated with the kingdom: gender equality, environmental sustainability, and technological innovation....... After an IMAX-style introductory video, the first stop on this “megaprojects tour” was a model of one of three new futuristic cities that Saudi Arabia is set to break ground on next year, dubbed Qiddiya. Located 25 miles from the capital, Riyadh, the city is envisioned as an entertainment megaplex with everything from indoor ski slopes to roller coasters to a zoo. Guests on the preview tour could interact with a holographic lion or try out the mountain bike and race car simulators. Down the hall were previews of the second two cities, a Red Sea tourist resort and Neom, a tech hub that aims to have more robots than humans in its population. ........ The cities are part of Vision 2030, the kingdom’s ambitious plan to pivot the economy away from oil. The program was announced over a year ago, but the event, which ran from Oct. 24 to Oct. 26, was the “coming out” party — a chance for the global financial elite to see for themselves whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was, in the words of one investor, “for real.” The so-called Future Investment Initiative (FII) pulled in 3,500 attendees, including dozens of blue-chip executives. Crew members from the Saudi national airline helped guide potential investors through the hallways of the Ritz Carlton. Robot “concierges” stood outside panel rooms, playfully soliciting interaction and selfies. ........... The message was clear to all: For three decades, the state has worked assiduously to avoid offending the conservative religious elite, stalling the trappings of modernity that have catapulted development in cities such as neighboring Dubai. This conference was meant to seal that chapter and set out a new, aspirational end point. ....... “Before now, the government always made a balance between the liberal people and the conservatives. They gave this side something, [that] faction another thing,” said Amal al-Hazzani, a columnist at Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat and professor at King Saud University. “They kept trying to make that balance, until Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman came.… [H]e ended that era.” ........ Mohammed bin Salman is signaling to Saudis that they are embarking on a momentous reform project from which there is no turning back. Saudi Arabia will need a serious shaking up to bring its economic and social structure into the 21st century. ....... “Seventy percent of the Saudi people are less than 30 years old, and we will not waste 30 years of our lives dealing with extremist ideas — we will destroy them today,” Mohammed bin Salman told the gathering. “We want to live a normal life.” ........ Many conference attendees likely didn’t realize just how revolutionary certain aspects of last week’s event were. Bankers from London to Lagos enjoyed gender-mixed coffee breaks, where women weren’t required to wear the traditional abaya. There were no intermissions for prayers, which shut down Saudi businesses for 30 minutes multiple times a day. Only a handful of speeches began with the usual Islamic prayer. ......... ...Saudi Arabia’s urban dreams are almost absurdly large, and Mohammed bin Salman has been intimately involved in forming them. He first pitched the idea of building completely new cities in 2015, just after his father was elevated as king, and has since signed off on details — even down to the logo designs........ Neom, the centerpiece of the mega projects, will cover more than 10,000 square miles — 10 times the size of Luxembourg. An initial press release described the city as “the safest, most efficient, most future-oriented, and best place to live and work” in the world....... Every piece of life in Neom will be linked to artificial intelligence: roads and cars will adjust to avoid traffic, and grocery orders will be fed directly to drone delivery units. Hydroponic growers will farm produce without soil, utilizing electricity produced by solar panels........ The city aims to attract top tech talent from across the globe, incentivizing businesses to flock to Neom through preferential regulation. Social life and gender norms will be drawn from “global best practices,” a term that serves as the default answer to any question about how something in the city — whether transport or official language — will work.......... Mohammed bin Salman’s personal support and the emphasis on good regulations was “very reassuring. It’s also something that we didn’t hear in the last three decades.”...... State-led plans such as Neom often miss the organic, bottom-up tech ecosystem that breeds innovation. Meanwhile, the Gulf cities that Neom hopes to rival — Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and even Doha — have a decade-plus head start......... Watching corrupt ministers face charges, incompetent consultants lose their jobs, and longtime undersecretaries demoted is starting to change the work culture. Fatani says the new ethos is, “Just get it done.” ............ Mohammed bin Salman will surely need to remain mindful of simmering conservative frustrations. The very bureaucrats he aims to reform may also push back, quietly delaying projects, sitting on approvals, or just heading home from work early. The stagnating price of oil, skepticism from investors, or regional instability could also set progress back.
#NEOM : A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity? https://t.co/hD6oNXMLMk @IsraeliPM @netanyahu @MustafaKheriba @JassimAlseddiqi @KingSalman @KSAmofaEN @RoyalSaudiNews @NEOM @ImranKhanPTI @narendramodi @iamsrk @aamir_khan @BeingSalmanKhan @saudiarabia @ksamissionun
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) December 7, 2019
#NEOM : A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity? https://t.co/hD6oNXMLMk @sundarpichai @satyanadella @Google @Microsoft @tim_cook @BillGates @elonmusk @richardbranson @bchesky @Apple @amazon @JeffBezos @facebook @finkd @sherylsandberg @AdamMGrant @garyvee @fredwilson @bfeld
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) December 7, 2019
#NEOM : A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity? https://t.co/GoSoFY4JYe @kbsalsaud @HRHPSAUDS @sattam_al_saud @afalsaud @dr_khalidalsaud @a_albander @SkyNewsArabia @Adhwan @TurkiHAlhamad1 @naifco @abdulrahman @altemyat @SamiAlJaber @mustafa_agha @k_alshenaif @adelalmulhim
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) December 7, 2019
#NEOM : A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity? https://t.co/GoSoFY4JYe @bnznan @AzizbagBag @bnznan @SSuwailm @aalrashed @Matar_Alahmadi @Barjasbh @70sul @tmafaisal @S_M_A_AlFaisal @adelalfarraj @Salman_3G @khaled_q28 @a_alhanyan @H_swilhy @Muwafig @gbadkook @SalmanAldosary
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) December 7, 2019
#NEOM : A Fundamental Departure For All Humanity? https://t.co/GoSoFY4JYe @TurkiHAlhamad1 @hailahabdulah20 @mahalwabel @DrLalibrahim @amfozan @269saud4 @NajeebZamil @fahadalahmdi @almodifer @waleedalfarraj @HRHPFAISAL1 @majedhogail @HamadAlMuneef #Saudi #SaudiArabia
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) December 7, 2019
UAE is role model of tolerance: Pope Francis https://t.co/fMxBfADgrm pic.twitter.com/EbxQS8YJjs
— UAE News (@UAENews) December 7, 2019
Tuesday, November 19, 2019
NEOM, Jerusalem: Twin Cities?
My Take On NEOM, The City
NEOM: A City
Getting To Know Mustafa Kheriba
Vertical Forests
Apple, Android, And Ancient Greece
Neil Sahota, Andrew Yang And The Creative Destruction Of Jobs By Robots And AI
The Real Burj Khalifa (In The Foreground)
I have had a little bit more time to think about NEOM in the back of my mind. Ends up it is all about location, location, location!
The make or break part of the concept of NEOM is, can it be economically viable? In NEOM's case that means, can it attract some of the top tech entrepreneurs of the emerging technologies? Lucky for NEOM, because Israel is right there.
The tiny nation of Israel beats all of Europe when it comes to tech, and Europe is no slouch. The idea can no longer be accepting Israel. The idea now has to be to embrace Israel.
Embrace these days means to build a hyperloop from NEOM to Jerusalem to Tel Aviv. Egypt is building itself a new capital. It could be a triangular hyperloop: NEOM to Jerusalem to Cairo.
NEOM: A City
Getting To Know Mustafa Kheriba
Vertical Forests
Apple, Android, And Ancient Greece
Neil Sahota, Andrew Yang And The Creative Destruction Of Jobs By Robots And AI
The Real Burj Khalifa (In The Foreground)
I have had a little bit more time to think about NEOM in the back of my mind. Ends up it is all about location, location, location!
The make or break part of the concept of NEOM is, can it be economically viable? In NEOM's case that means, can it attract some of the top tech entrepreneurs of the emerging technologies? Lucky for NEOM, because Israel is right there.
The tiny nation of Israel beats all of Europe when it comes to tech, and Europe is no slouch. The idea can no longer be accepting Israel. The idea now has to be to embrace Israel.
Embrace these days means to build a hyperloop from NEOM to Jerusalem to Tel Aviv. Egypt is building itself a new capital. It could be a triangular hyperloop: NEOM to Jerusalem to Cairo.
NEOM, Jerusalem: Twin Cities? https://t.co/36JzX2Gxjy @IsraeliPM @netanyahu @MustafaKheriba @JassimAlseddiqi @KingSalman @KSAmofaEN @RoyalSaudiNews @NEOM @ImranKhanPTI @narendramodi @iamsrk @aamir_khan @BeingSalmanKhan @saudiarabia @ksamissionun #NEOM #SaudiArabia #princesalman
— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) November 20, 2019
Friday, January 22, 2016
How Do You Explain This? Brain Power?
Unbelievable stat on the immense success of #israel from the awesome @jamesdcameron @Accel https://t.co/PFKpLTreZ7 pic.twitter.com/qBzH83lOoa
— The Twenty Minute VC (@twentyminutevc) January 22, 2016Sunday, October 25, 2015
Israel
Israeli technology is everywhere.Israeli technology is everywhere. Powerful video by Calcalist כלכליסט
Posted by START-UP NATION on Thursday, October 22, 2015
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Tech Aviv
A Fan Of Israel
Europe's hottest startups 2015: Tel Aviv
Berlin And Tel Aviv: How Two Top Startup Hubs Are Stacking Up
Behind Israel's Startup Success Is A Mountain of International Collaboration
Europe's hottest startups 2015: Tel Aviv
The startup nation became the exit nation in 2014, with Israeli tech sales and IPOs hitting $15 billion (£9.5bn) ..... "What sets Israel and Tel Aviv apart is its openness" ..... "You can meet almost anyone, and everyone knows and talks to -- and about -- each other." ..... "Entrepreneurs will focus not only on innovative technologies," he says, "but on building disruptive companies out of Israel." ...... Consumer Physics wants to build a molecular map of the world ..... StoreDot has developed a smartphone battery that can be charged in one minute. ...... Windward analyses commercial satellite feeds and maritime data to track the location and contents of every major seafaring vessel in the world .. Its aim: real-time updates and insights for maritime markets and intelligence agencies. ...... Moovit's transport app provides real-time public navigation on buses, trains and tubes. Using a combination of public-data feeds and feedback from users, it claims to provide travel times more accurately than its rivals. ......... Zebra Medical teaches computers to diagnose diseases. .. has partnered with Israeli imaging centres and universities worldwide to build a database of images. "We have millions of diagnosed MRIs, CT scans and X-Rays," says Gura. In April it secured $8m in funding led by Khosla Ventures. ....... Calling itself "the Robin Hood of fees", FeeX identifies hidden charges in investment and retirement funds
Berlin And Tel Aviv: How Two Top Startup Hubs Are Stacking Up
They are home to two of the world’s most dynamic tech startup hubs. Separated by 3,000 miles the cities of Berlin and Tel Aviv share a surprising number of similarities in terms of their startup cultures. ..... “The Berlin way is extremely structured and long term and Berlin’s startups usually think big. They set high goals. And then they create very detailed roadmaps in order to drive the company towards them. People really believe that ‘big dreams start small’,” says Kagan, a Tel Aviv native whose career in ad-tech spans more than ten years. ....... “And this is great for us as managers, since it forces us to combine innovative thinking about the future and practical thinking about the present. Tel Aviv, on the other hand, has an approach that is more spontaneous, with less hesitation when starting up and more improvisation along the way.” ...... While Berlin has more local business angels than big investors, Tel Aviv’s venture capital, per person, is much higher and mostly from non-Israeli investors. ........ Alibaba is a case in point. Earlier this year the world’s largest e-commerce firm made a strategic investment in Jerusalem Venture Partners worth tens of millions of dollars.
Behind Israel's Startup Success Is A Mountain of International Collaboration
How Israel became Israel is a complicated story. ........ The truth is that to become the #2 startup ecosystem in the world after Silicon Valley, it’s taken a complicated calculus of educational, societal, and entrepreneurial influences to make Israel the economy it is. ....... Did you know that in Massachusetts alone, Israeli companies doing business there have generated over $6.2 billion in 2013 and employ 6700 people in the state? ....... emerging sectors such as nanotechnology, robotics, and 3-D printing coming from collaboration between Israeli and global scientists, entrepreneurs and business partners. .......
the young country has always focused on human resources to address its natural resources problem.
...... The high-end of Israel’s academic world has shined brightly over the past few decades, winning numerous Nobels and contributing to the advancement of science globally. While science has flourished, Israel has a lot to learn from global educational institutions. One interesting development to watch is Cornell University’s partnership with Israel’s Technion (considered the M.I.T. of Israel). ....... Israel is still trending up as the U.S.’s #3 innovation partner, right behind Switzerland and Canada. So, as Israel, the Startup Nation, grows into its big-boy, Scale-up Nation shoes, other nations looking for its secret sauce can look directly to its partnering ability for guidance. Israel’s technology and startup ecosystem have both benefited from and created global partnerships that work to support growth in Israeli ingenuity on a global scale.
Sunday, July 21, 2013
One Gig Is The Real Deal
 |
| Image via CrunchBase |
Chambers predicts the network will bring in major changes: healthcare where doctors are connected instantly to providers' and hospitals' databases, with all records kept electronically and updated constantly; an education-anywhere system, where students can learn at home, in class, or elsewhere, communicating with teachers and fellow students over the internet; safer roads and streets (a major issue in road accident-prone Israel), with traffic authorities able to keep better tabs on speeders and unsafe drivers; and a proliferation of "internet of things" technology, with sensors keeping air conditioners, refrigerators, washing machines, front doors, and more connected to systems than can enable better and more efficient allocation of electricity and other resources. In a few years, all of this should be in place, according to Chambers...... unlike most other places, Israel "is truly a start-up nation". ..... "Israel is second to the US in the sheer number of startups, but because of the population differences, Israel's 'per capita startup' ratio is much higher," he said.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Stuxnet And The Confounded Mullahs
Image via WikipediaNew Scientist: Stuxnet: the online front line: Stuxnet, the computer worm running rampant in Iran's nuclear facilities ..... a few lines of malicious computer code can trip electricity grids, burn out power-station generators, pollute water supplies and sabotage gas pipelines. ....... Where regular worms merely infect computer systems, stuxnet can reach out into the physical world. It uses vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows to give an attacker remote control of the specialised factory-floor computers used to control industrial processes. ..... The worm can allow attackers to run motors so fast they burn out, to turn off alarms and safety cut-offs, open effluent valves and activate pumps - in other words, carry out industrial sabotage and skulduggery on a massive scale.Unless we have some high tech mullahs in Iran, my guess is they are one confounded crowd. As to the origins of stuxnet, your guess is as good as mine. It is possible this has been the work of the Pentagon, like the Iranian regime has been claiming, possibly even the work of Israel, but I doubt that. Biblical references in malicious code do not prove the worm is Israel's work. It is very possible some teenager cowboys, either in Israel or America, and as much likely elsewhere, took it upto themselves to tickle the Iranian regime a little.
Whoever might be behind this, and we might not even know, very likely, this stunt has rattled the mullahs like threats of economic sanctions have not so far.
When they start arresting "spies" is when you know they got it all wrong. That is a symptom of being confounded. Obviously you do not have to be inside of Iran to pull this stunt. That is the whole point of cyber attacks.
Monday, July 12, 2010
To Iran, With Love (3)
Image via CrunchBaseHappy July 4 Fred Wilson, Brad Feld
The Germans Called Me Robin Hood
To: Brad Feld, Subject: Iran And Me (Digital Ninja/Commando)
Rome - Phoenix W/ Devendra Banhart
Brad Feld
To Iran, With Love (1)
To Iran, With Love (2)
North To Alaska
To continue with our conversation, in this post I am going to tackle two questions.
- What can I do for Iran based on what I have done for Nepal?
- Why am I seeking 5K in personal money from 20 VCs towards this? Why not from some other crowd?
What Can I Do For Iran Based On What I Have Done For Nepal?
Not everyone believes every country should or is going to end up a democracy, it is only a matter of time. Not only do I believe that, I believe that process can be accelerated, and I believe a democracy movement is science, it can be made to work every single time. Elections alone do not make a democracy, we know that. Otherwise they have elections in Iran, in Zimbabwe, in Egypt. Heck, Saddam used to have elections.
Iran is not a democracy. An unelected committee of mullahs is the supreme authority in that country. Only candidates sanctioned by that committee can run for president. That is no democracy.
You determine a country is not a democracy. And then you determine all the steps it has to take to end up a democracy. There are a lot of preceding preliminary steps, but ultimately a sufficient bloc of groups inside and outside the country has to set the right goal, which would be to shut the country down completely until the current regime makes way for an interim, caretaker government that would come into power with a mandate to hold elections to a constituent assembly within a year of taking power. That assembly would get two years to write a constitution for the country. A majority block in that assembly would form the government. Each article in the constitution would require two third of the votes in the assembly.
That is the roadmap. My personal project is only upto the point of regime change. Once the interim, caretaker government takes over, I am officially out, although I can't imagine completely disappearing. On my own I would continue to monitor the situation part time. There would have been too much emotional investment on my part to that point for me to just walk away.
Why Do It?
Because this is the right thing to do. Because we care about the people of Iran as much as people anywhere. Because we are huge fans of them for what they have been doing for over a year now. Because we believe in the power of democracy to do good. And because we want peace in the Middle East.
People say there is no peace in the Middle East because it is a few different religions clashing with each other. I don't buy into that. If diversity were the reason for lack of peace, New York City where I live ought to be at permanent war with itself. I don't see evidence to that effect.
There is no peace in the Middle East because Israel is the only democracy around there. When a democracy tries to talk to a neighborhood of non democracies, you get The Mother Of All Culture Clashes.
And there is also a need to prove the netroots, the grassroots are powerful enough unto themselves to be able to bring about democracy into a country. No country, not even the US, can afford to militarily go into every country. It is too expensive. And it is not even the best way to do it.
A people powered democracy movement in Iran would ignite similar conflagrations in Saudi Arabia and Egypt. In seeking a successful conclusion of the democracy movement in Iran, we seek the bringing about of a domino effect.
How To Do It?
"I am one small human being," my fellow Buddhist Richard Gere once said about himself. I am but one small human being. But I have proven in the case of Nepal that one human being sufficiently digital and with sufficient political acumen can make a big difference.
It is like in the movie The Matrix. You sit in front of your computer, your terminal, and you transport yourself to the theaters of action. You observe and study the reality, the ever changing reality, in all theaters of action, and you propose action plans everywhere you can. You have no institutional authority, noone elected you, you are not doling out money, and so you have to be extra, extra right, extra convincing before people will do your bidding, before people, the key players, will listen to you to do what needs to get done.
Month One: Immersion
I would spend about a month totally immersing myself. I am going to collect as much information as possible. I am going to network feverishly. I am going to network among the members of the Iranian diaspora in New York City, and more online.
Roadmap
Then I am going to start working to gather support for my roadmap. If the democracy movement in Iran sticks to the goal of holding the presidential election all over again, it will keep banging its head against the wall. For the goal to be shifted to regime change, I will have to network deep enough to be able to determine that leadership change for the movement can be brought about without losing the fissures that have been created in the Iranian establishment by the movement so far.
Logistical Support
As for the global netroots/grassroots, all those people who turned their Twitter avatar green, they also need to shift their goal post. Extending moral support is not enough. Logistical support has to be provided. Once the movement decides to wage one final struggle, we will have to get very sophisticated about it.
We have to document every act of atrocity by the current regime. It has to be publicly announced that the interim, caretaker government will persecute all those who might unleash brutality upon peaceful protesters. You do that to protect your people best you can.
But brutality will happen. And we have to provide medical services to take care of those who might get injured in the course of the democracy movement.
Working on these two concrete steps also helps do the organization work for the movement, helps build a robust network.
All Digital, One Person
Many individuals and organizations in many countries will have to do just the right thing at the right time for this to work. And you do have to take all possible actors into count. But my particular role is going to be the role of one person who works all digitally. The world is connected enough by now that that digital activism could prove decisive. Geography is not a hindrance. And there is and there will be enough information from and about all relevant theaters of action, and where that is not enough, you connect the dots best you can.
This is doable.
Larger Implications
An Iran that is a modern democracy is still going to want to make peaceful use of nuclear energy as it should, but it is not going to be sinister and unreasonable like the non democratic Iran of today. A democratic Iran is still going to speak up for the Palestinians, as it should, but it is not going to scapegoat Israel for all its internal failures, and promises not kept to its own people.
Israel today feels an existential threat from Iran's possible nuclear weapons. That threat is primarily political. Russia still had all the nuclear weapons, but once the Cold War ended, America was no longer feeling the threat from those weapons, Europe was not feeling the threat. Israel is not going to feel an existential threat from an Iran that is a democracy.
Why Me? Why You?
We don't ask why techies had to do Kiva. We don't wonder why we did not leave all that to the traditional microfinance people. You and I are members of the tech community. I need you to think of me as a member of the community who wants to take some time off from full time tech startup work and do this for a period of 15 months, for that should be enough time, to help bring about this positive change. This is about doing the right thing, but this is also about proving the Internet as a technology is mature enough, the world is connected enough, and that the digital ways are powerful enough.
If I were to get State Department sponsorship, that would hinder my work. God forbid, if I were to get CIA sponsorship, that would totally paralyze my capacity to do what I want to do. This has to happen at the netroots level, where you and I exist and at the level you and I have the option to reach out to all sorts of causes all over the world.
Why You?
If you have been a prominent VC for a few decades, I think you can afford to put in 5K of your personal money into this. It is doable for you.
Why Me?
I have done this before. I can do this again. And this work ties into what I want to do after that, which would be to launch my tech startup that will want to help bring many more people online. I can't say I was born in India, so I am going to think about the people in India, or that I grew up in Nepal, and so I am going to focus on Nepal. Bringing people online is a global endeavor, and I have to be able to show I can care deeply about people in places like Iran where I have never been, but where I do know there is an acute need. This work will allow me to prove that, show that.
It will also allow me to further work on my two strengths: vision and group dynamics. Here you are talking about large scale group dynamics. I have a knack for that. It is an important business skill.
And if I can do what I am saying I can, I think that is going to earn me some credibility that I can cash on when it is time for me to raise some money for my startup in about 15 months. That is the self interest part.
No Time To Lose
So, let's get started. You two come in at 5K each. And you have until the end of July to find me other 18 VCs who will also come in at 5K each. And if I can get this done by September 2011, you all get to raise another 2.5K each. That will be your way of saying it was a big goal, but it got achieved, and so.
Not everyone believes every country should or is going to end up a democracy, it is only a matter of time. Not only do I believe that, I believe that process can be accelerated, and I believe a democracy movement is science, it can be made to work every single time. Elections alone do not make a democracy, we know that. Otherwise they have elections in Iran, in Zimbabwe, in Egypt. Heck, Saddam used to have elections.
Iran is not a democracy. An unelected committee of mullahs is the supreme authority in that country. Only candidates sanctioned by that committee can run for president. That is no democracy.
You determine a country is not a democracy. And then you determine all the steps it has to take to end up a democracy. There are a lot of preceding preliminary steps, but ultimately a sufficient bloc of groups inside and outside the country has to set the right goal, which would be to shut the country down completely until the current regime makes way for an interim, caretaker government that would come into power with a mandate to hold elections to a constituent assembly within a year of taking power. That assembly would get two years to write a constitution for the country. A majority block in that assembly would form the government. Each article in the constitution would require two third of the votes in the assembly.
That is the roadmap. My personal project is only upto the point of regime change. Once the interim, caretaker government takes over, I am officially out, although I can't imagine completely disappearing. On my own I would continue to monitor the situation part time. There would have been too much emotional investment on my part to that point for me to just walk away.
Why Do It?
Because this is the right thing to do. Because we care about the people of Iran as much as people anywhere. Because we are huge fans of them for what they have been doing for over a year now. Because we believe in the power of democracy to do good. And because we want peace in the Middle East.
People say there is no peace in the Middle East because it is a few different religions clashing with each other. I don't buy into that. If diversity were the reason for lack of peace, New York City where I live ought to be at permanent war with itself. I don't see evidence to that effect.
There is no peace in the Middle East because Israel is the only democracy around there. When a democracy tries to talk to a neighborhood of non democracies, you get The Mother Of All Culture Clashes.
And there is also a need to prove the netroots, the grassroots are powerful enough unto themselves to be able to bring about democracy into a country. No country, not even the US, can afford to militarily go into every country. It is too expensive. And it is not even the best way to do it.
A people powered democracy movement in Iran would ignite similar conflagrations in Saudi Arabia and Egypt. In seeking a successful conclusion of the democracy movement in Iran, we seek the bringing about of a domino effect.
How To Do It?
"I am one small human being," my fellow Buddhist Richard Gere once said about himself. I am but one small human being. But I have proven in the case of Nepal that one human being sufficiently digital and with sufficient political acumen can make a big difference.
It is like in the movie The Matrix. You sit in front of your computer, your terminal, and you transport yourself to the theaters of action. You observe and study the reality, the ever changing reality, in all theaters of action, and you propose action plans everywhere you can. You have no institutional authority, noone elected you, you are not doling out money, and so you have to be extra, extra right, extra convincing before people will do your bidding, before people, the key players, will listen to you to do what needs to get done.
Month One: Immersion
I would spend about a month totally immersing myself. I am going to collect as much information as possible. I am going to network feverishly. I am going to network among the members of the Iranian diaspora in New York City, and more online.
Roadmap
Then I am going to start working to gather support for my roadmap. If the democracy movement in Iran sticks to the goal of holding the presidential election all over again, it will keep banging its head against the wall. For the goal to be shifted to regime change, I will have to network deep enough to be able to determine that leadership change for the movement can be brought about without losing the fissures that have been created in the Iranian establishment by the movement so far.
Logistical Support
As for the global netroots/grassroots, all those people who turned their Twitter avatar green, they also need to shift their goal post. Extending moral support is not enough. Logistical support has to be provided. Once the movement decides to wage one final struggle, we will have to get very sophisticated about it.
We have to document every act of atrocity by the current regime. It has to be publicly announced that the interim, caretaker government will persecute all those who might unleash brutality upon peaceful protesters. You do that to protect your people best you can.
But brutality will happen. And we have to provide medical services to take care of those who might get injured in the course of the democracy movement.
Working on these two concrete steps also helps do the organization work for the movement, helps build a robust network.
All Digital, One Person
Many individuals and organizations in many countries will have to do just the right thing at the right time for this to work. And you do have to take all possible actors into count. But my particular role is going to be the role of one person who works all digitally. The world is connected enough by now that that digital activism could prove decisive. Geography is not a hindrance. And there is and there will be enough information from and about all relevant theaters of action, and where that is not enough, you connect the dots best you can.
This is doable.
Larger Implications
An Iran that is a modern democracy is still going to want to make peaceful use of nuclear energy as it should, but it is not going to be sinister and unreasonable like the non democratic Iran of today. A democratic Iran is still going to speak up for the Palestinians, as it should, but it is not going to scapegoat Israel for all its internal failures, and promises not kept to its own people.
Israel today feels an existential threat from Iran's possible nuclear weapons. That threat is primarily political. Russia still had all the nuclear weapons, but once the Cold War ended, America was no longer feeling the threat from those weapons, Europe was not feeling the threat. Israel is not going to feel an existential threat from an Iran that is a democracy.
Why Me? Why You?
We don't ask why techies had to do Kiva. We don't wonder why we did not leave all that to the traditional microfinance people. You and I are members of the tech community. I need you to think of me as a member of the community who wants to take some time off from full time tech startup work and do this for a period of 15 months, for that should be enough time, to help bring about this positive change. This is about doing the right thing, but this is also about proving the Internet as a technology is mature enough, the world is connected enough, and that the digital ways are powerful enough.
If I were to get State Department sponsorship, that would hinder my work. God forbid, if I were to get CIA sponsorship, that would totally paralyze my capacity to do what I want to do. This has to happen at the netroots level, where you and I exist and at the level you and I have the option to reach out to all sorts of causes all over the world.
Why You?
If you have been a prominent VC for a few decades, I think you can afford to put in 5K of your personal money into this. It is doable for you.
Why Me?
I have done this before. I can do this again. And this work ties into what I want to do after that, which would be to launch my tech startup that will want to help bring many more people online. I can't say I was born in India, so I am going to think about the people in India, or that I grew up in Nepal, and so I am going to focus on Nepal. Bringing people online is a global endeavor, and I have to be able to show I can care deeply about people in places like Iran where I have never been, but where I do know there is an acute need. This work will allow me to prove that, show that.
It will also allow me to further work on my two strengths: vision and group dynamics. Here you are talking about large scale group dynamics. I have a knack for that. It is an important business skill.
And if I can do what I am saying I can, I think that is going to earn me some credibility that I can cash on when it is time for me to raise some money for my startup in about 15 months. That is the self interest part.
No Time To Lose
So, let's get started. You two come in at 5K each. And you have until the end of July to find me other 18 VCs who will also come in at 5K each. And if I can get this done by September 2011, you all get to raise another 2.5K each. That will be your way of saying it was a big goal, but it got achieved, and so.
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