Capitalogix

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - June 5th, 2022

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links:

• Xerox Parc's Engineers on How They Invented the Future and How Xerox Lost It. (Spectrum)
• How to Use Flow State to Do the Impossible. (BigThink)
• Why a Bee Can Be Considered a Fish. (Slate)
• A High Percentage of Consumers Really Don't Understand Percentages. (WSJ)
• Absurdle, Heardle and 21 Other Wordle Alternatives to Waste Time On. (CNet)

 

Trading Links:

• The Global Economy Rebounds, Stumbles Again. (GeopoliticalFutures)
• How Asset Classes Have Performed After Interest Rate Hikes. (Advisor)
• Visualizing Historical Oil Prices (1968-2022). (VisualCapitalist)
• Here are this Year's Fortune 500 Companies by Region. (Fortune)
• Robots are All the Rage as Factories Struggle With Labor Shortage. (Cheddar)

 

Don't Touch That Dial

History may not repeat itself exactly ... but it often rhymes. News stories, however, seem to replicate.

There is nothing wrong with your television. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are now controlling the transmission. We control the horizontal and the vertical. We can deluge you with a thousand channels or expand one single image to crystal clarity and beyond. We can shape your vision to anything our imagination can conceive. - The Outer Limits (1963)

 

via YouTube

It almost feels like an episode of Black Mirror, watching these stations quote the same pre-determined diatribe on fake news and its danger to our democracy.

The very message they are purportedly supporting, in the video above, directly contradicts their actions. 

Most people realize this happens to some degree, but it seems different when presented like this.

I believe I am reasonably aware and somewhat immune from propaganda. That probably isn't as true as I'd like to believe.

Meanwhile, Sinclar Broadcast Group owns nearly 200 stations in 80 different markets and wants to buy more. That is a powerful platform to deliver mass messages and influence the zeitgeist of its audience.

It used to be true that winners wrote history (think empires, wars, etc.). Now, the one that delivers the most broadcast narratives shapes the emotional and seemingly logical responses to what we perceive to be happening around us.

The result impacts elections, financial markets, buying choices, and countless other areas of our life. 

We see and hear it every day about politics, wars, economic issues, and many other things we don't focus on enough to notice.

As A.I., Bots, and social media grow, our ability to discern truth from 'truthiness' weakens. Especially with the growth of deepfakes. 

What do you think about this?