NOTE: At some point, before bed, I read through 50+ news sources and share my findings here. If you like it, share it. If you don’t, share it. Follow my blog now to support my work or to find new reasons to complain about it. My opinions are my own. All tips are welcome as well as comments on my video series - The Jim Stroud Show.
FYI: Are you watching Conservative Television of America? If so, be sure to tune in to the network on Tuesdays at 8:00 pm EST because that is when my show airs on that network. Yay! So exciting!!!
Facebook Censored the People and the People are Censoring Back
Facebook’s latest infraction against free speech is removing Facebook pages of US Truckers organizing protests against vaccine mandates.
There are no shortages of complaints being levied against Facebook, yet they have weathered the storm despite security issues, protests and a number of unscrupulous business practices. Perhaps changing their name to Meta was a way of distancing themselves from the cloud of controversy that surrounded them? If so, there are signs that it might not be working. Facebook has roughly 2 billion active users worldwide. However, that number is in flux and potentially on a downward spiral. Why? For the first time – EVER, Facebook lost one million daily active users in the most recent quarter; according to Axios.
As a result, Facebook’s stock (I know its META now but, its still Facebook to me) nosedived 20 percent which cost the company over $200 billion dollars. And since Mark Zuckerberg is one of the top major stockholders in Facebook (META, whatever) he took a hit on his personal finances – bigly. How bigly? $29 Billion dollars!
So, what’s to blame for so many people leaving all at once? Zuckerberg thinks its competition from the likes of TikTok. To quote NikkeiAsia…
“People have a lot of choices for how they want to spend their time, and apps like TikTok are growing very quickly,” Zuckerberg said on Meta’s earnings call.
NOTE: At some point, before bed, I read through 50+ news sources and share my findings here. If you like it, share it. If you don’t, share it. Follow my blog now to support my work or to find new reasons to complain about it. My opinions are my own. All tips are welcome as well as comments on my video series - The Jim Stroud Show.
Did you know that I have interests that go beyond politics? As proof of that, I am sharing this special report on robot sex dolls. Why this topic? I find it fascinating and once my imagination is captured, I tend to fall through a rabbit hole of research and here we are. I will be writing on more topics that interest me in the future. As such, if you have any ideas, please send them my way. Cool? Thank you in advance.
QUICK NOTE: Are you watching Conservative Television of America? If so, be sure to tune in to the network on Tuesdays at 8:00 pm EST because that is when my show airs on that network. Yay! So exciting!!!
Special Report: Robot Sex Dolls are Evil (… this is why.)
Okay… This was is a doozy. Check out this quote from a short article that was published by The Daily Star on February 16, 2019.
An emerging sexual identity known as “digisexuality” is said to be gaining traction among open-minded youngsters in Britain, Japan, Russia and the United States.
Research by academics Neil McArthur and Markie Twist, who co-authored a paper titled “The Rise of Digisexuality”, suggests the trend is becoming more commonplace. These digisexuals are forgoing humans in favour of intimate, and even sexual, relationships with advanced computer software and lifelike robots, according to Markie and McArthur.
So, how do you feel about that? I think the trend and movements like it mark the end of all humanity. Sound bizarre? Hear me out.
The whole idea of sex with robots does not compute with me, pun intended. That being said, I can understand why some people choose it as an alternative. No, not for the thrills or to satiate some perverse curiosity; but because loneliness is a very real issue in modern society. For example, did you know that 3 in 4 Americans struggle with loneliness, to one degree or another? Senior researcher Dr. Dilip Jeste, a professor of psychiatry and neuroscience with the University of California, San Diego has been studying the loneliness epidemic. Here are some of his findings.
Dr. Jeste observed that loneliness peaked at certain points in a person’s life, during the late 20’s, mid-50’s and late 80’s..
The late 20s are a time when people are making choices that will affect the rest of their lives, such as their career, their choice of life partner and where they will settle. “It really puts a lot of responsibility on you,” Jeste said. “It’s a really difficult period. And when you compare yourself to others, you might feel you aren’t doing as well as your peers.”
The mid-50s are when people tend to experience a mid-life crisis, as signs of aging highlight the fact that their time on Earth is limited. “You see some of your friends dying, sometimes family members,” Jeste said. “You become aware of your mortality for the first time.”
The late 80s are a time of increased helplessness. Half of people at this age have dementia, and their physical abilities are in decline. “Often you’ve lost your spouse, and you don’t have many people left around you, either family or friends,” Jeste said.
So, all that being said, are robots, really, the best way to cure loneliness? Several companies seem to think so; you certainly notice it in the elderly care space. For example, Japan has been experimenting with robots in assisted care living for the elderly. The Robobear is a robot designed to scoop elderly folks from their beds and deposit them in a wheelchair. The Care-O-Bot has been deployed in a number of German assisted living facilities. It is able to ferry food and drinks to residents from the kitchen as well as keep them entertained by playing memory games to help keep their minds sharp. And the robot – ElliQ tracks its users pill regimen and connects them to family, friends, and medical professionals through video calls and social media. It also acts as a companion. From what I have seen, these solutions make sense. After all, there is a shortage of careworkers worldwide. Yet, as I consider this, from a global perspective, there is no shortage of people to have sex with. Sure, it may be challenging connecting with the right person for you, nonetheless there are a lot of people out there. So, why sex with robots? For a while, I just did not understand then, I had an epiphany.
If you were to ask a millennial if they would have sex with a robot, there is a 27% chance they would say “yes,” according to Havas, a French multinational advertising and public relations company. I suppose some of that 27% are members of the the digisexual trend I mentioned at the beginning of this article. So, if there is already a market for digisexuals, people open to relationships and sexual intimacy with robots, why wouldn’t human traffickers focus on this as a viable alternative to kidnapping innocent children? Its legal, has low financial risk and high profits. Case in point…
Lumidolls is a robot sex brothel. It was founded in 2017 by a group by Spanish entrepreneurs from Barcelona seeking to capitalise on the expanding market for sex dolls and robots. The opening of the first Lumidolls venue, just off Barcelona’s famous La Rambla boulevard, opened in February 2017. By the end of April, 2017, Lumidolls opened a second franchise in Moscow after striking an agreement with Russian investors keen to export the brand to the city. Today, they have brothels in four countries.
Umm… wow.
If you were to ask the Sexdoll makers what were the benefits of their products beyond gratification, they are quick to say that their products provide a mental health benefit, promote safe sex or therapy for people with companionship issues. They could also alleviate social isolation. And they would say all of that with little scientific research to back it up. (I found one study referenced here. I also found one that said the exact opposite.) But for argument’s sake, let’s assume that sex dolls are rewarding beyond personal gratification. Do those rewards outweigh the consequences? I think not.
What if people became so used to having sex with robots that they forget how to have a traditional relationship with another human being? Or worse yet, refuse to be intimate with another human being altogether. It can happen. Case in point…
Once upon a time on Reddit, a social news and discussion website, there was a community called MGTOW, or Men Going Their Own Way. Their first rule? Abandoning all romantic relationships with women. More than 15,000 readers were subscribed to the MGTOW page which declared it was for “men going our own way by forging our own identities and paths to self-defined success; cutting through collective ideas of what a man is.” The forum was later banned from Reddit for hate speech and inciting violence, according to Newsweek. If you do a web search for MGTOW, you will find several websites supporting their philosophy. And despite their alleged hatred for women (they see themselves standing up for men’s rights rather than hating women), homosexuality isn’t accepted, either.” In other words, and this is what I think this movement is inferring, who needs women? I have my brothers for companionship and sex workers (or robots) for sexual gratification. (This is only my initial impression. I admit to being ignorant on their philosophy beyond what I related.)
Could sex robots stop human trafficking? Possibly. Yet, the widespread use of sex bots could bring about an even bigger issue – the end of humanity. And just in case you think I’m joking, Japan’s birth-rate fell below one million in 2017 (and another record low in 2020), a trend that has partially been blamed on the rise of sex dolls by some demography experts. A 2018 documentary by RT, titled “Substitutes” explores the concerning trend of Japanese men opting for sex dolls instead of women and how it fuels “a national mood of loneliness and alienation.” I highly recommend checking it out. In a nutshell, the message is this, people are having less sex and as a result, there is a declining birthrate in Japan and that’s a problem. In fact, in the documentary, Kanako Amano, of the NLI Research Institute is quoted as saying, “The Japanese are at a crossroads, facing the threat of extinction.”
Okay, let’s jump 15 minutes into the future and sexbots are in the mainstream. What then? What about all the issues I brought up? What could be done to save humanity! Well…
Psychologists could help people come to grips with how human relationships traditionally work.
People of faith could steer people to a greater morality that would promote the sanctity of marriage, celebrate monogamy and the rewards of fatherhood.
Hollywood and Pop Culture could assist as well by sending messages along that same theme.
I imagine that the education system could step in and offer more classes like “An Introduction to Dating” which is an actual college level course at Dongguk University in South Korea.
Umm… that’s all I can think of, for now.
I think it would take a unified effort of all these things to change the global culture and greatly reduce, if not eradicate, the growing popularity of sexbots. I would like to think that the demise of humanity would be a big enough incentive. But, I could be wrong. What do you think?
Jim
P.S. I produced a video on this topic a few years back. If you want additional insights on this topic, check it out.
I stumbled across the video below. Its a bit dated [2013] but, still relevant. It reminded me of a podcast I produced last year called, “What happens to your data when you die?” After the video is the transcript from the original podcast and a few resources I’ve found since then. Let me know your thoughts?
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Hi, I’m Jim Stroud and this is my podcast.
Okay, now this is interesting. Facebook may eventually have more dead users than living ones. According to a study by Oxford Researchers, Facebook will have 4.9 billion deceased users on its system by the year 2100. If Facebook’s current growth rate continues, the dead would outpace the living by 2070. And this brings to mind, an interesting question… What happens to your data after you die? I’ll share a few insights after this.
The 2018 Identity Fraud Study released today by Javelin Strategy & Research, revealed that the number of identity fraud victims increased by eight percent (rising to 16.7 million U.S. consumers) in the last year, a record high since Javelin Strategy & Research began tracking identity fraud in 2003. The study found that despite industry efforts to prevent identity fraud, fraudsters successfully adapted to net 1.3 million more victims in 2017, with the amount stolen rising to $16.8 billion. With the adoption of EMV (embedded chip) cards and terminals, the types of identity fraud continued to shift online and away from physical stores. The complexity of fraud is also on the rise as criminals are opening more new accounts as a means of compromising accounts consumers already have.
As reprehensible as that criminal activity is, there are some who take this practice to a disgusting level of depravity; in a very real sense they hunt the dead. Listen to this TV news report from WZTV Fox 17 in Nashville, TN.
With both of those reports, you heard some tips on how to prevent the recently deceased from being victimized by identity thieves but, you’re still alive. What should you be doing now to keep that from happening to you? Evan Carroll, co-author of “Your Digital Afterlife” has a lot of tips for you. I’ll share three.
Make an inventory of all your digital assets. That includes the documents on your computer, the photos on your phone, any data stored on thumb drives or backup disks, and every online account, including the ones you no longer use. It’s a big job, but you don’t have to do it all at once, Carroll says. Start with the most important things and work your way down the list. Odds are your primary email account will be number one, since that’s typically where online accounts send password resets.
Figure out what you want to happen to all of this stuff after you’re gone. Do you want your family to have access to all your emails? How about photos? Videos and other material you’ve downloaded? There may be some things you don’t want your loved ones to see. Decide now, and make your wishes known to those you care about.
Assign someone to be your digital executor. Be explicit in your will about what you want to happen to your assets. Don’t assume your survivors automatically have a right to it all, because the law varies greatly from state to state, Carroll says. On his blog, The Digital Beyond, he offers some sample power-of-attorney language to include in your will.
A few more considerations for you…
Facebook allows people to make a special request for a deceased person’s account. You can ask to have their Facebook account removed, or to memorialize their account. Facebook will require you to send them a scan of your loved one’s death certificate.
It is possible to request that certain imagery be removed from a deceased family member’s Twitter account. Twitter might not remove what you ask them to – based on the newsworthiness of the content. There is a simple form you can fill out to request the deactivation of a deceased person’s Twitter account.
Everplans is a secure, digital archive of everything your loved ones will need should something happen to you. It has helpful information about how to create a digital estate plan, how to close accounts after someone has died, how to eliminate all the skeletons in your closet, and more.
Here begins some new information I’ve found since I produced that podcast. If you find it useful, feel free to pass it on.
Someone shared this documentary with me and my mouth dropped to the floor. I could not believe how EASILY people could buy slaves through mobile apps. Check out this documentary and pass it on. When will the big tech giants stop this abomination?
…
BBC News Arabic’s undercover investigation exposes the people in Kuwait breaking local and international laws on modern slavery, including a woman offering a child for sale. At the centre of this powerful investigative film is Fatou, a 16 year old in Kuwait City who has been there for nine months. We follow her rescue and journey back home to Guinea, West Africa and ask: what’s being done to control the apps promoted on Google, Apple and Facebook-owned Instagram?
Google dropped its motto – Don’t be evil in 2018. In 2020, I can see why. Tune in to see what I mean. #privacy #censorship #MindControl Big respect to DuckDuckGo!
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT
Hi, I’m Jim Stroud and this is my podcast.
Back in May 2018, Google quietly removed its famous ‘Don’t be evil’ motto from the introduction to its code of conduct. As spotted by Gizmodo, the phrase was dropped from the preface of Google’s code of conduct in late April or early May. Until then, ‘Don’t be evil’ were the first words of the opening and closing sentences of Google’s code of conduct and have been part of it since 2000. So, I’m wondering, has Google been evil since removing its famous motto? I’ll share some recent, rather controversial, articles about Google and let you decide. Stay tuned.
Do you like junk food? Of course you do, who doesn’t? So, its likely you have some junk food in your cabinet or refrigerator. What if one of your friends was a personal trainer? They spot the junk food in your house and immediately begin tossing it in the trash . When you ask them what they’re doing. Their response is “trust me, its for your own good.” Most likely you would be offended because you rightly believe that you have the freedom to make your own decisions and that choice was taken away from you. Well, that’s kind of what Google is doing when it comes to their Google Drive system. If you store a video on your Google Drive that Google does not approve of, Google will remove it. Yes, I said what you just heard. Listen to these quotes from the website – Reclaim The Net.
Ever since Big Tech platforms started cracking down on what they deem to be coronavirus misinformation, the media has been willfully flagging alleged violations to social media companies and getting content taken down.
And now the file storage and sharing service Google Drive has started to take down users’ files in response to media complaints about them containing coronavirus misinformation.
In an article reporting on the takedown, The Washington Post’s Silicon Valley Correspondent Elizabeth Dwoskin complains that after the coronavirus documentary Plandemic was censored on social media, some YouTube clips were telling users how to access “banned footage” from the documentary via Google Drive.
She then notes that after The Washington Post contacted Google, Google Drive took down a file featuring the trailer for the Plandemic documentary.
…
The Plandemic trailer isn’t the only file that’s been censored on Google Drive in recent months.
After SpaceX and Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk linked to what Dwoskin describes as a “questionable study” about the efficacy of the drug hydroxychloroquine in March, Google blocked access to the document.
For many Google Drive users, the service is their only file storage solution and they use it to save copies of videos and posts that have been deleted or censored on other platforms.
If this precedent continues, it could mean these users have their only copy of content that has been scrubbed from social media platforms taken down because they shared a link to those files with other people.
…
The takedown of the Plandemic file is reflective of the increasingly aggressive moderation standards big tech companies are employing when it comes to what users are allowed to say about the coronavirus.
Okay, another scenario. Imagine that you are in love or, something similar, and you take some rather provocative photos and videos intended to be seen only by your lover. Well, things happen, you break up and your racy photos and videos are online and easily found with a Google search on your name. Feeling extremely embarrassed, you contact Google and explain things. You tell them that it not only embarrasses you but, endangers your livelihood. You even get a lawyer involved! Google’s response? Too bad. So sad. We will not remove a thing. Listen to these quotes from the NY Post.
…I pleaded with Google’s “Legal Removals” team to show mercy on 15 women I represented in a case against a porn company. My clients, all aged 18-22, had answered deceptive bikini-model ads and had become embroiled in a conspiracy to perform porn that resulted in some of them being raped before and during the shoots. These nonconsensual sex videos were then shared hundreds of thousands of times on popular porn sites.
…
We sent affidavits to Google urging them to remove the videos. Google’s policies dictate only two instances when they will remove content — child pornography and copyright-infringement requests.
The current policy says Google may remove nude or sexually explicit images that were shared without consent, but the company maintains sole discretion about when to remove nonconsensual pornography. If Google decides it will keep linking to a website that contains your nude images, victims are just out of luck. And there’s no appellate body. There is no law, only corporate policy, that protects (or fails to protect) victims’ most private information. Not even New York’s new revenge-porn laws help here because they are aimed at punishing the individual who nonconsensually shared the material and not the search engines that drive views.
Google knew these women had been tricked, held captive, sexually assaulted and humiliated and were suffering because of the exposure it was causing, but corporate interest dictated total indifference. To this day, Google will not remove those links from their search-engine results. The graphic evidence of abuse now haunts these women as they apply for jobs, use social media, seek roommates, date. Most of these women remain underemployed, terrified and unable to lead normal lives because Google won’t lift a finger on the basis of its cynical corporate policy.
Google is the number one search engine in the world. According to Statcounter, Google handles 91.89% of all search engine searches. The second most popular search engine is Bing with 2.79% search engine market share. This gives Google an unprecedented amount of control over how we think. For example, if you have no knowledge about peanut butter sandwiches and you search Google for information then, chances are your views on peanut butter sandwiches will be formed by what you find on Google. Now imagine that instead of peanut butter sandwiches, you are curious about a political candidate.
In an undercover video from the media company – Project Veritas, a Google Insider exposed the bias that Google has against President Trump. In no uncertain terms, they were very much against him politically and are determined to do all they can to prevent his reelection. Now, no matter where you are on the political spectrum, this should concern you. In effect, Google is taking delight in steering your thoughts so you think the way they want you to think. Listen to this clip from Project Veritasthat exposes Jen Gennai, Head of Responsible Innovation at Google and others.
Did you hear any remorse in that testimony from Google? I didn’t either. If Google’s indifference towards manipulating search results to guide your way of thinking does not bother you nor, its censorship of informationthat you keep in your private Google Drive nor its lax attitude towards removing embarrassing data that threatens your way of life then, I have one more consideration that is sure to bother you indeed. I’ll share that, right after this.
How do you feel about Google knowing you better than your friends and family? Even if you’ve done nothing wrong and “have nothing to hide,” what about the potential of hackers getting personal information and using it to steal from you or harm your reputation or endanger the lives of people you associate with?
John Battelle is an entrepreneur, author and journalist. Among his claims to fame, is helping to launch WIRED magazine, founding the annual Web 2.0 Summit and his popular book, “The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture,” describes the history and impact of search engines and the late emergence of Google from a field of competitors. He also writes the blog – “Searchblog” where one of his readers asked him a very interesting question back in 2006.
His reader asked,” Does Google keep logs of searches correlated with IP address or other personally identifiable information for users who have not logged in?”
John Batelle answered, “I knew it kept parts of this data, but was not sure. So I pinged Google PR, which checked in for me (thanks!). The response was to quote Google’s privacy FAQ:
Like most Web sites, our servers automatically record the page requests made when users visit our sites. These “server logs” typically include your web request, Internet Protocol address, browser type, browser language, the date and time of your request and one or more cookies that may uniquely identify your browser. In other words, yes, Google does record this data. But, does it KEEP that data, I asked?
The answer: Yes, we do.
Now that was in 2006. Google now has a service called Google Takeout that lets you download your data from its various services. But, to quote C|net…
“…just because you set Google not to track your online or offline activity doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve closed off your data to Google completely. Google has admitted it can track your physical location even if you turn off location services using information gathered from Wi-Fi and other wireless signals near your phone. Also, just like Facebook has been guilty of doing for years, Google doesn’t even need you to be signed in to track you.
Not to mention, there are sometimes seeming contradictions between Google’s statements on privacy issues. For example, Google recently admitted to scanning your Gmail messages to compile a list of your purchases in spite of publicly declaring in a 2018 press release, “To be absolutely clear: no one at Google reads your Gmail, except in very specific cases where you ask us to and give consent, or where we need to for security purposes, such as investigating a bug or abuse.” Perhaps by “no one” Google meant “no human,” but in an age of increasingly powerful AI, such a distinction is practically moot.
![What happens to your data when you die? [Transcript]](https://blog.jimstroud.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/digitalafterlife.jpg)
