Capitalogix

The Cities Of The Future

Studying historical changes in human population trends offers valuable insights into the factors that have propelled or hindered human development throughout time.

From ancient civilizations to modern metropolises, population dynamics have influenced everything from economic prosperity to social structures.

 

A Window Into Our Past Gives Us a Glimpse at Our Future.

By studying this critical aspect of human history, we can gain valuable insights into the past, present, and future of societies.

Population growth is a complex and multifaceted phenomenon with far-reaching implications. It offers a fascinating glimpse into the demographic trends that have shaped our world and continue to influence our trajectory.

Historically, human populations grew steadily but relatively slowly ... until something changed that. 

Scientists estimate that humans have existed for over 130,000 years. However, it took until 1804 for us to reach 1 Billion. We doubled that population by 1927 (123 years later) and then doubled it again only 47 years later (which was 1974). 

Looking back, early population growth was driven by the agricultural revolution. Since 1804, the Industrial Revolution, health and safety advances, along with technology, have significantly improved quality of life, spurring the rapid population growth. Here is a quick overview of some of the key factors.

Shaping the Future

It’s hard to predict some things accurately. So, one goal in data science is to figure out what we can “know” in order to “guess” less.

Population growth is a prime example. One of the easiest ways to predict how many 60-year-olds there will be in 40 years is to look at how many 20-year-olds there are today. Obviously, the number won’t be exact, but it’s a pretty good head start.

This principle of using known data to make educated predictions applies to many aspects of future planning, including urban development and resource allocation. By leveraging current demographic information, we can better prepare for the challenges and opportunities that will likely impact the cities of tomorrow.

• Economic Implications: A growing population can expand the workforce, fueling economic growth. However, it can also strain resources, requiring increased investment in infrastructure, education, and healthcare.
• Social and Environmental Pressures: Demographic shifts, such as aging populations or youth bulges, can profoundly affect social structures, healthcare systems, and the environment.

 

Why It Matters

Population growth is more than just a numerical metric. It is a fundamental lens through which we can analyze:

• Historical Development: By understanding past population trends, we can better appreciate the factors that have shaped human civilizations.
• Future Planning: Governments, businesses, and organizations can use population data to make informed decisions about resource allocation, infrastructure development, and social policies.

 

Have World Population Growth Numbers Peaked?

World population growth rates peaked in the late 1960s and have declined sharply in the past four decades, but we’re still on a positive trend. We’re expected to reach 9 billion people by 2050, but a lot of that growth comes from developing countries – they also almost exclusively come from urban areas. 

via Axios (Click for an Interactive Graph)

Urbanization: Megacities

In the 1800’s, about 10% of the population lived in urban areas. Since 2014, over 50% of the world’s population has lived in urban areas – today it’s approximately 55%. That number is growing.

Ironically, as we grow more digitally connected, our world is shrinking, and our populations are concentrating. 

An interesting consequence of this rapid urbanization and population growth in developing countries has been the increased development of Megacities – defined as cities with populations greater than 10 million. Today, there are 33 megacities – more than triple the number in the 1990s. 

This creates a set of interesting opportunities and challenges. 

For example, how will these cities deal with infrastructure – sanitation, transportation, etc?

 

via visualcapitalist

Today, in most high-income countries, about 80% of the population lives in urban areas - contrasting the primarily rural populations of lower-income countries. 

As a result, we see many of these megacities forming in developing countries. As a side note, we’re also seeing countries like China making substantial investments and alliances in these developing areas. This is likely done to profit from the expected growth and also to shift the future balance of power in their favor. Sometimes, it makes sense to focus on the marathon and not just the sprint.

It’s interesting how the world can become more decentralized - and more globalized - amidst a contraction of where people live.

Some Perspective: "I'm Way Closer To Lebron Than You Are To Me!"

With the NFL starting its regular season this week, I was thinking about the talent and effort it takes to compete as a professional athlete.

Take a second to reflect on the journey required to become a pro. In general, the top players from a youth league became standouts in high school and then were star players in college before eventually making it to a professional team. But here's the kicker ... in any other context, they're elite, but unless they're superstars in the NFL, they're considered average or worse. Think about it. By definition, half of the players are below average. 

Meanwhile, I recently came across an example from the NBA that illustrates this concept in a funny but profound way.

There's a relatively famous quote from NBA journeyman, Brian Scalabrine, who said: 

"I'm way closer to Lebron (James) than you are to me!" - Brian Scalabrine

For context, as a USC Trojans men's basketball player, Scalabrine was the top scorer and a leader in field goals and rebounds. He then played 11 years in the NBA ... but at no point in that time was he a star. He didn't put up great (or even good) stats, he wasn't a household name (though he did pick up the nickname "White Mamba"), and he is nowhere near the caliber of player that Lebron James is. In fact, throughout his career, he averaged just 3.1 points, 2.0 rebounds, and .8 assists a game. But, remember, he was good enough to play at a pro level for 11 years.

As a result, many unprofessional (weekend warrior) athletes thought he was an easy target. One day, Brian was playing a rec league game where he dropped 60 points. He tweeted about it, and a bunch of people started tweeting back to the now 40+ years old former NBA player that they could beat him. There are funny YouTube videos about this.

Brian responded by replying:

"Listen. I may suck for an NBA player. Those guys are pretty good. But I don't suck compared to you. You suck compared to me." - Brian Scalabrine

He then accepted their challenge by asking them to send in videos of their play and committed that he would go 1-on-1 against the best of them.

Scalabrine then went on to play 4 of the best players who responded, with one of them having NCAA D1 experience.

The end result?

He outscored them 44-6 - with two of the players scoring 0 points. 

 

via YouTube

It should be self-explanatory, but it seems to be a concept many people struggle with. Any given pro player has been the best of the best throughout their journey. They're the 1% of the 1%. 

But that is probably true for you too. If you're reading this article, you're likely killing it compared to the average Joe. 

Many of us are in rooms with phenomenal business owners and operators. When you meet people like Peter Diamandis, Ray Dalio, or Richard Branson, it's easy to focus on the distance between you and them.

Recognize that it is still a huge accomplishment to be a Brian Scalabrine rather than a Joe Schmo. 

They don't recognize what you and me do recognize. When you're in the NBA, there's all kinds of tells, right? Like if a guy puts his hand like that, you know what he's gonna do. If a guy does a hesitation, you know what he's gonna do. All that stuff is like in real time in the NBA, you got to be so on top of the reads. It's not speed. You can't look at me and say my brain is slow. My brain is fast. My body might be slow, but I have to read whether a guy's gonna shoot, drive, go to the middle, pass. If you're not reading those things, you're not playing in the NBA. - Brian Scalabrine

A helpful reminder.

Keep it up – and as always ... Onwards!

Pattern Recognition In Trading

The Market has been volatile recently, with unusually large gains and losses as we enter the homestretch of the election season. Even though many markets are still near their highs, I'm sensing an increase in anxiety and fear in many of my peers. 

While some believe that markets are random, others make money using rule-based trading systems that rely on specific patterns to identify favorable trading conditions.

Traders, at every level, search for a tradable edge. Some find it in fundamental analysis, others in technical analysis or chart-based patterns, while still others rely on an algorithmic or execution-based edge.

So, is there some magic unifying equation that defines the Market? Personally, I doubt it. Even though nothing always works, "something" always works in the markets. The challenge is to identify what that is and to ignore the rest. 

Though many patterns work, from time to time, when a particular pattern works may seem random, and here is why.

Understanding the Markets. 

There is no such thing as a "Market" ... It is a collection of separate traders (each trading based on what they focus on, what they make it mean, and ultimately what they decide to do).

As a result, one of the reasons that markets experience volatility is that different groups buy or sell for different reasons at different times.

Consequently, even if one group trades using a consistent set of rules, a strategy that effectively combats it only works until that group stops trading those rules.

It works the other way too. If a large trader imposes their will, it changes the playing field for smaller traders.

Elephants Leave Tracks. 

Smart traders follow the big money.

Large traders like governments, sovereign wealth funds, or mutual funds can affect markets while they buy or sell.

However, when they're done, some other group's strategy becomes the dominant force.

Experienced traders recognize that it is important to understand "who is in control" ... but not necessarily why they are trading.

That means you don't have to figure out every bit of information or rationale behind a strategy to make money. For example, suppose you were about to walk into a movie theater but were suddenly confronted with hundreds of people running in the other direction screaming. In that case, you don't have to understand precisely why it's happening to respond intelligently.

 
On a superficial level, that's the basis of trend following. It is also an example of pattern recognition.

Most hedge funds now use some form of pattern recognition in their trading systems.

Much of the analysis done to get a trading edge is simply a way to identify "who is in control" and what they are doing ... rather than why they are trading.

Here, we will examine why some traders rely on specific patterns to identify favorable trading conditions.

Some Patterns Are Logical.

Let's look at a common trading pattern called a "Triangle". You can think of the Triangle as a well-contested battle between the bulls and the bears. It is almost like an arm-wrestling match. Inside the pattern, neither side gives up much ground. However, when one side loses conviction, the market surges in the direction the winners push. 

Here is a picture of a Triangle and the pattern's likely price projection.

 

  

Triangles are an example of a logical pattern. It is easy to see and easy to understand. In addition, it is easy for a trader to use a setup like this to define the likely risk and reward of a trade they are considering.

Why Do Patterns Form in Markets Repeatedly? The Answer is Human Nature.

Markets are not always logical. Some would argue that Markets are rarely logical. If they were, intelligent people would get rich by following their instincts ... but that isn't how it works.

On some level, markets represent their participants' collective thoughts and emotions. So, even though conditions change, the collective response to fear and greed remains reasonably similar.

As a result, many patterns show up in market price data.

In General, Here's What Is Happening.

A move up of a certain degree will be met with some people who fear the move won't go higher ... so they decide to sell. Meanwhile, others will believe the move will trigger a whole different group of people to recognize an opportunity ... so they decide to buy.

The same thing happens with a big move down. At first, it triggers fear and selling. But at some point, to a particular group of traders, the move down will look like a discounted buying opportunity.

At its core, price is the primary indicator of investors' willingness to buy or sell. Things like velocity or slope are secondary, and show the intensity of their motivation.

So, many of the patterns that you read in books or magazines (with names like "head and shoulders", or "cup and handle", or "double bottoms") are all just ways of explaining the natural response to certain conditions.

 
  

There is science involved in recognizing a specific pattern ... and art in selecting which pattern to rely on today.

But You Don't Have to Predict Anyone's Action - All It Takes Is An Intelligent Response.

It's the law of large numbers. An insurance company doesn't have to accurately predict when any individual will die; their actuaries have to figure out a reasonable estimate of how many people like that in their risk pool will die during the relevant period ... and price the coverage accordingly. Likewise, in the Market, patterns don't predict what an individual will do; they indicate what the majority will likely do.

So now that you understand patterns, the rest is easy ... right?

Of course, it's not as easy as it sounds because these patterns are being played out across every Market and happen in different time frames as well. That means some people respond to the Market using a much longer time horizon than others. A pattern for them may be noise at a different level of focus.

It may be comforting to see familiar patterns occur whether you're looking at a minute-by-minute chart of the S&P or a weekly chart of gold ... but comfort doesn't make you money. Instead, ask whether what you are looking at is a coincidence or causal. Said another way, does it simply explain what happened, or is it a valid prediction of what will happen?

Since many patterns are playing out across many markets at any given time, a human can't identify, validate, and trade all of them in real-time.

This is where computers and artificial intelligence truly shine. For example, we've developed a pattern mining technology that doesn't rely on traditional technical analysis patterns. Instead, it searches for patterns across various markets and time frames, uncovering edges that humans would never be able to detect on their own.

But even that simply adds more ways to win.

The only thing I can confidently predict is that volatility and noise will increase due to how markets work and the arms race for enhanced technical capabilities and information asymmetry. As volatility and noise continue to rise, what separates smart money from dumb money will likely be the ability to focus on what matters when it matters.

It is hard to do – and even harder to do consistently. But some things are inevitable. While technology may not immediately replace all human traders, it's becoming increasingly evident that those who leverage computers and advanced technology will outperform and eventually replace traders who rely solely on their human capabilities.

We live in interesting times.

An Antidote For Anxiety & Scary Times

People seem rattled right now, don’t they?

Wallets have been tight, and fears of a recession have run rampant.

Even though markets and the economy are not the same thing, many voters believe they are. Consequently, in an election year, I suspect the government will push every button and pull every lever to boost the market leading into November.

Speaking of the markets, they have been pretty volatile the last few weeks. They have posted some of their worst days since COVID-19 but some of the best, too.

We find ourselves in a particularly partisan election year, with lots of uncertainty about who is running, what they stand for, and whether they can make a difference – or even do the job.

The situation feels worse because scary geopolitical events (that threaten World War 3) punctuate seemingly endless negative news cycles.

Now, on to the real point ... those things don’t matter and shouldn’t steal your focus. Why? Because that’s the playing field we all have to navigate.

There will be winners and losers. The key distinction lies in whether you choose to focus on opportunities or risk. 

So, I thought this would be an excellent time to revisit how to cope with losses and manage your anxieties in “scary times.” 

The Anxiety Antidote

During scary times, many people suffer from “I should have ...”, or “if I would have ...”, or “if I could have ...” thoughts.

The problem is that thoughts like those create more stress and distraction. 

I’m reminded of a quote.

"When the trough gets smaller ... the pigs get meaner." - Dan Sullivan

 

 

Negative focus highlights loss, difficulties, past events, missing things, and what you don’t want.

Think of them as an unhealthy reflex that wastes energy, confidence, and time.

All We Have To Fear Is Fear Itself  

I often talk about market psychology and human nature. The reason is that markets reflect the collective fear and greed of their participants... people tend to get paralyzed during scary times like these.

But it’s not the economy that makes people feel paralyzed. People feel paralyzed because of their reactions and their beliefs about the economy. Your perception becomes your reality. 

A little examination reveals that most fear is based on a “general” trigger rather than a “specific” trigger. In other words, people are afraid of all the things that could happen and are paralyzed by the sheer scope of possibilities. These things don’t even have to be probabilities to scare them.

You gain a competitive advantage as soon as you recognize that it’s not logical. Why? Because as soon as you distinguish that fear as not necessarily true, you can refocus your insights and energy on moving forward. You can act instead of react. You make better decisions when you come from a place of calm instead of fear... so create that calm. 

Even a tough environment like this presents you with opportunities if you watch for them ... or even better ... if you create them. 

The Scary Times Success Manual

The goal is to move forward and feel better.

Strategic Coach offers ten strategies for transforming negativity and unpredictability into opportunities for growth, progress, and achievement. They call it the “Scary Times Success Manual,” and what follows are some excerpts:

Forget about your difficulties, focus on your progress.

Because of some changes, things may not be as easy as they once were. New difficulties can either defeat you or reveal new strengths. Your body’s muscles always get stronger from working against resistance. The same is true for the “muscles” in your mind, spirit, and character. Treat this period of challenge as a time when you can make your greatest progress as a human being.

Forget about events, focus on your responses.

When things are going well, many people think they are in control of events. That’s why they feel so defeated and depressed when things turn bad. They think they’ve lost some fundamental ability. The most consistently successful people in the world know they can’t control events - but continually work toward greater control over their creative responses to events. Any period when things are uncertain is an excellent time to focus all of your attention and energy on being creatively responsive to all the unpredictable events that lie ahead.

Forget about what’s missing, focus on what’s available.

When things change for the worse, many desirable resources are inevitably missing - including information, knowledge, tools, systems, personnel, and capabilities. These deficiencies can paralyze many people, who believe they can’t make decisions and take action. A strategic response is to take advantage of every resource that is immediately available to achieve as many small results and make as much daily progress as possible. Work with every resource and opportunity, and your confidence will continually grow.

Forget about your complaints, focus on your gratitude.

When times get tough, everyone must make a fundamental decision: complain or be grateful. In an environment where negative sentiment is rampant, the consequences of this decision are much greater. Complaining only attracts negative thoughts and people. Gratitude, on the other hand, creates the opportunity for the best thinking, actions, and results to emerge. Focus on everything you are grateful for, communicate this, and open yourself to the best possible consequences.

 Click here to download the full PDF version.

Final Thoughts

We can pontificate all day long on the short-term causes of the rises and falls of markets, but I don’t think it does much good. I let the algorithms worry about those. It’s the larger trends we have to be personally aware of.

I sound like a broken record, but volatility is the new normal.

• Markets exist to trade, and if there’s no “excitement” on either side, trades don’t happen.
• Trades are getting faster, which means more information has to confuse both the buyer and the seller.
• You’re no longer competing solely against companies and traders like you. It’s like the cantina from Star Wars; you’ve got a bunch of different creatures (and bots) interacting and fighting with each other, trying to figure out how to make their way through the universe.

Pair that with all the fear and uncertainty, and you’ve got a recipe for increased volatility and noise. That means that the dynamic range of a move will be wider and happen in a shorter period of time than ever before. You’ll hear me echo this thought over the next few years as the ranges continue to expand and compress. Cycles that used to play out over weeks now take days or hours. The game is still the same; it just takes a slightly different set of skills to recognize where the risks and opportunities are. 

Today’s paradigm - both in life and trading - is about noise reduction. It’s about figuring out what moves the needle and focusing only on that.

The crucial distinction is between adding data and adding information. Adding more data does not equal adding more information. In fact, blindly adding data increases your chances of misinformation and spurious correlations.

My final comment is that there’s a difference between investing and trading, and while humans can invest, if you’re “personally” still trying to trade - you’re likely playing a losing game. If you don’t know what your edge is, you don’t have one. 

If you’re investing, I’ll advise you to act like a robot. If you removed human fear and greed from your decision-making - what would you do?

Keep calm and carry on.

The Most Hyped Technologies of the 00s

The Gartner Group’s Hype Cycle research provides the raw material for some of my favorite posts every year.

It is a graphical and conceptual presentation used to represent the maturity, adoption, and social application of popular technologies.

Here is a link to a Gartner research note on understanding Hype Cycles.

I’ve found that they are an excellent source of well-researched tech and business analysis. As another example, here is a video of their Top Ten Tech Trends for 2024.

 

via YouTube

Humans are famously bad at predicting the future of technologies. We tend to overestimate technology’s abilities in the near term and massively underestimate what it can do in the long term.

The shape of that curve has come to be known as the Gartner Hype Cycle, and the five stages of that curve are important for any entrepreneur or investor to understand.

via Gartner

In general, as technology advances, it is human nature to get excited about the possibilities and disappointed when those expectations aren’t met. 

At its core, the Hype Cycle tells us where we are in the product’s timeline and how long it will likely take the technology to hit maturity. It attempts to tell us which technologies will survive the hype and have the potential to become a part of our daily lives. 

Gartner’s Hype Cycle Report is a considered analysis of market excitement, maturity, and the benefit of various technologies. It aggregates data and distills more than 2,000 technologies into a succinct and contextually understandable snapshot of where various emerging technologies sit in their hype cycle.

Here are the five regions of Gartner’s Hype Cycle framework:

1. Innovation Trigger (potential technology breakthrough kicks off),
2. Peak of Inflated Expectations (Success stories through early publicity),
3. Trough of Disillusionment (waning interest),
4. Slope of Enlightenment (2nd & 3rd generation products appear), and
5. Plateau of Productivity (Mainstream adoption starts). 

Understanding this hype cycle framework enables you to ask important questions like “How will these technologies impact my business?” and “Which technologies can I trust to stay relevant in 5 years?”

If you are curious, here is Perplexity’s explanation of Gartner’s Hype Cycle and related research. 

Another methodology uses frequency analysis to identify the “most hyped” concepts and technologies.  

VisualCapitalist recently put together an infographic highlighting the most hyped technologies of each year. They call it the “Peak of Inflated Expectations”.

 

(Click To See Full Infographic) via VisualCapitalist

Here’s a Summary of the most hyped technologies, by year, since 2000.

• 2000 - Wireless Web, ASPs, Bluetooth
• 2001 - Web Services, Enterprise IM, m-Commerce
• 2002 - Biometrics, Grid Computing
• 2003 - Process Portals
• 2004 - Micro Portals, Virtual Content Repositories
• 2005 - P2P VOIP, Biometric ID Documents, BPM Suites
• 2006 - Mashup, Web 2.0 
• 2007 - Legal P2P, Digital Video Broadcasting
• 2008 - Green IT
• 2009 - Cloud Computing, e-Book Readers, Social Software Suites
• 2010 - 4G Standard, Activity Streams
• 2011 - Internet TV, NFC Payment, Augmented Reality
• 2012 - BYOD, 3D Printing, Complex Event Processing
• 2013 - Big Data, Gamification, Wearable User Interfaces
• 2014 - IoT, Natural-Language Question Answering, Cryptocurrencies
• 2015 - Speech-To-Speech Translation, Advanced Analytics, Autonomous Vehicles
• 2016 - Blockchain, Cognitive Expert Advisors, Machine Learning
• 2017 - Virtual Assistants, Connected Home, Deep Learning
• 2018 - Biochips, Digital Twin, Deep Neural Networks
• 2019* - 5G, AI PaaS, Graph Analytics
  *Missing from the infographic, but updated by Gartner

As we take our smartphones for granted, it’s hard to imagine Bluetooth, wireless web, or e-book readers as emerging technologies at this point - but at one point in time, the lightbulb was an emerging technology. 

It’s also interesting to look at which technologies peaked in a hype cycle ... and which now popular technologies no longer appear on this list. For example, despite Virtual Reality being around since the 80s, I still expected to see it on this list. 

Cryptocurrencies, “smart homes”, and several older examples are in a recession - but that doesn’t mean they won’t have resurgences. 

As a reminder, the hype cycle and the innovation adoption cycle are often on very different time scales. It’s very possible that technologies from the early 2000s may still have their heyday. 

What are you surprised wasn’t on the list? And, what do you think is about to get added?

We live in interesting and exciting times!

Cultivating An Innovator's Mindset

To some, new technology is a good thing. To others, less is more.

Most people simply “tolerate” technology transitions, some people drive them, and others crave them and use them as a catalyst for growth or strategic advantage.

The description begins with resistance and progresses towards compulsion. Reversing this sequence allows us to illustrate the innovation adoption process.

Here is a visualization of the innovation adoption model and market share.

In the image above, the blue line represents consumer adoption (taken from Geoffrey Moore’s “Crossing the Chasm,” while the yellow line represents market share. 

As you can see, only 2.5% of the population drive innovation (or adopt it early enough to help drive the Alpha & Beta versions of emerging technologies). 13.5% make up the Early adopters, who help get it ready for the mainstream. Then, the early and late majorities are the groups that ultimately consume (or use) the mature product. Meanwhile, Laggards are often forced kicking and screaming into “new” technologies as the early adopters are well on their way to subsequent iterations. 

Here is a link to Perplexity’s description of Crossing the Chasm’s innovation-adoption model and other key concepts from the book.

Even if you are not an innovator, here are a few Innovator Mindsets that I find useful. 

1. You Believe There’s A Better Way
   • Wherever you are, you know that there is a best next step, and you are eager to find it and take it.
   • You recognize that the opportunity for more (or better) often lies just beyond the constraints or problems of the current way.
   • The bigger future fuels your efforts. When initial excitement fades, understanding what the bigger future can bring helps you power through.
2. You Are Comfortable Being Uncomfortable
   • You understand that Pioneers sometimes take arrows in the back.
   • When creating a new reality, you expect some resistance as a result of the law of averages. Escaping the status quo takes a lot of momentum, but it’s worth it. 
   • You recognize when victory is near. In a quirk of human nature, too many people quit just before they would have won. Don’t make that mistake.
3. You Know Where You’re Going, Even If You Are Not Sure How You’re Going To Get There
   • Your goal should be your North Star. A clear direction is essential to ensure that activity leads to progress.
   • Measure progress and momentum rather than the distance from your goal.
   • It is easier to course-correct while in motion.
   • If you’re too committed to a path that isn’t leading in the right direction, you might find what Blockbuster, RadioShack, and Kodak found.
4. You Are Married To Questions (Not Necessarily Answers)
   • Everything works until it doesn’t; and nothing works forever.
   • It’s easy to find an answer (and think it’s correct), but there’s always a best next step or a better way.
   • Figure out what you want and how to get it. This is much more empowering than focusing on what you don’t want ... or why you can’t get it.
   • Ask questions that focus on opportunities or possibilities rather than challenges ... or what you want to avoid.
   • Energy flows where focus goes.
   • Commit to finding a way!

I plan on sharing more Innovator Mindsets. Let me know what you think.

The 2.9 Trillion Dollar Drop

Last Friday was the stock market’s worst day since COVID. 

The media says weak job reports and recessionary fears fueled it.  Geopolitics might have played a part, too.

Over 2.9 Trillion Dollars got wiped out. 

To visualize what happened, here is a market heatmap of the S&P 500 index stocks categorized by sectors and industries.  Size represents market cap.  There was very little green in a sea of red.

 

via FinViz

Last year, I asked if we would see a recession in 2024?  Here is an excerpt from that post:

 

I want to remind people that the U.S. is resilient, and it seems like public sentiment is moving in a positive direction. 

That said, 84% of CEOs and 69% of consumers think we're headed toward a recession. Meanwhile, the Fed is positive we won't ... and banks are almost positive we won't. 

It seems like they know something we don't ... or maybe vice versa. 

To lend some credence to the bullish sentiment, consumer spending is still high despite inflation and interest rates. In addition, Retailers are still posting solid earnings.

Unfortunately, we're increasingly seeing consumers resort to borrowing (including short-term lending options) to pay for goods. Household debt has hit a record high of $17 trillion in March.

— Are We Going To See A Recession In 2024?, October 2023

Yes, last week was potentially alarming.  Even the ordinarily resilient tech giants took a hit. 

With the unemployment rate reaching 4.3% in July, the three-month moving average is at least 0.5 percentage points above the minimum of the previous 12 months’ averages.  This triggers the Sahm rule, which supposedly signals a recession.  According to the rule, reaching the 0.5% threshold indicates a recession.  When the jobless rate rises quickly, it suggests the economy is slumping.

But, even the inventor of the rule, Claudia Sahm, says the doomsday narrative may be overblown. 

I’m not here to tell you that everything is sunshine and roses, but I am here to remind you that no indicator exists in a vacuum.  While the negative performance is real, household income is still growing, and consumer spending and business investment remain resilient.

Not to mention that with graduation, there’s a massive increase in the workforce, which also impacts the numbers. 

Recessions can build slowly - but come quickly - but as they build, there is time to react ... and even better - there is time to not ‘react’ but ‘respond’. 

AI will likely impact the workforce, business, and eventually ... the economy. 

I’ve learned that the market often feels random because you can’t predict events like global pandemics, threats, assassinations, or cybersecurity outages.

Over time, I’ve focussed less on guessing what will happen and more on responding faster and better to what happens.

With that said, I do have an opinion here.  It’s an election year, and I suspect the government will push every button and pull every lever to boost the market leading into November.  Even though markets and the economy are not the same thing, many voters believe they are.  So, I would say this correction is perfectly timed ... and I anticipate a steady ramp-up so that people feel as good as possible about the economy when they vote.

What do you think is going to happen?

The Power Of Assessments

Over the years, I've used a number of different assessment tests on myself and our team. It's a great way to help people better understand each other and the various forms of communication and problem-solving styles we use.

Here are several of the tests that have proven themselves time and again:

1. Kolbe measures how individuals naturally approach problem-solving and execute tasks when free to be themselves.
2. Predictive Index (PI) - helps organizations make data-driven, objective hiring decisions by providing insights into a candidate's personality traits and cognitive abilities in relation to their perceived role.
3. StrengthsFinder: helps people discover their natural talents and develop them into strengths they can leverage for personal and professional success.

On top of these, it's always fun to see what else is available and how it might provide new and useful insights. 

For example, Ray Dalio recently created a personality assessment called PrinciplesYou that you can take for free. This tool breaks down personality traits into three areas: how you think, engage with others, and apply yourself. I've seen several articles praising PriciplesYou and its insights.

Less meaningful, perhaps (but still fun), I also found a website called Human Benchmark that lets you test your performance on various reaction and memory tests. I'm unsure how scientific it is, but it was an interesting use of 10 minutes nonetheless. Here are my son's results from that one.

via Human Benchmark

Progress starts by telling the truth ... most often to yourself.  

What assessments have you found particularly helpful?

Lessons From The CrowdStrike Outage ...

Last Friday, CrowdStrike experienced a significant issue with a content update for its Falcon sensor on Windows hosts, causing widespread IT outages affecting customers worldwide, including airlines, banks, shops, and broadcasters.

 

This outage dominated the news. Here are links to stories from Google and Bing search.

 

Surprisingly, I didn't hear about this until one of my employees told me. But that is probably because I use a Mac - and the outage didn't affect me.

 

So, when my son decided we should write an article about it ... I asked Perplexity.AI, "Can you explain the issue with CrowdStrike?" 

Perplexity is an AI chatbot-powered research and conversational search engine that answers queries using natural language predictive text. I've been quite impressed with it. If you haven't tried it yet, I highly recommend checking it out.

Here is an excerpt of what it told me about the incident:

 

Character of the problem:

• A defect was found in a single content update for CrowdStrike's Falcon sensor on Windows hosts.
• This caused Windows machines to crash, resulting in a "blue screen of death" (BSOD) and getting stuck in a restarting state.

Scope of the impact:

• Only Windows hosts were affected; Mac and Linux systems were not impacted.
• The issue affected various organizations globally, including banks, airlines, and other businesses.

CrowdStrike's response:

• The company quickly identified and isolated the issue.
• A fix was deployed, and the problematic update was pulled.
• CrowdStrike is actively working with affected customers to resolve the problem.

Important clarifications:

• This was not a security incident or cyberattack.

Click here to see the whole perplexity.ai response.

The scope of the outage was surprising. 

United, American, and Delta all called complete ground stops. Microsoft was hit. Public displays around the world showed the blue screen of death. 

All because CrowdStrike pushed a global update. That patch caused every computer with CrowdStrike to crash. Even worse, these computers can only be fixed in person by an IT professional. Because it involves a Blue Screen of Death, IT can't just remote in to fix it.  

It's probably the largest outage in history and has caused untold damage. It affected emergency services in some states and countries. 

Even after a patch is issued, it may take days for things to return to normal, as each endpoint requires individual attention, and some systems might have suffered complete failures.

via XKCD

It's a healthy reminder that our 'robust' infrastructure isn't always so robust ... and that tech consolidation and concentration can have consequences.

While there are a seemingly infinite number of tech companies now, the infrastructure has consolidated into the hands of very few. We need to think about our digital resilience, not just in the systems we run, but in the globally connected systems and in the growing Internet of Things. 

Does your business have all of its eggs in one basket? Does it have failsafes in case of an emergency?

As I observe the growing adoption of AI, I notice that people tend to emphasize its capabilities over its potential failures. In our increasingly interconnected and automated world, ensuring business continuity is more crucial than ever.

2024 Update: What Happens In An Internet Minute

The Internet is both timeless and timely in an interesting way.  While what's popular changes seemingly instantly, and what we're capable of doing on it continues to grow exponentially.  Ultimately, the Internet is the digital town square of a global village, where all types and professions gather. 

In 2011, I first wrote about what happens in 60 seconds on the Internet. 

I've since updated the article a few times.

• 2014
• 2018

Each time I write the article, I'm in awe at the amount of data we create and how much it has grown.  For example, looking back to 2011, I was amazed that users created 600+ new videos and 60 new blog posts each minute.  Those numbers seem quaint today. 

 

via DOMO

Shortly after I started sharing the articles, Data Never Sleeps started standardizing the data, which is helpful. 

Today, the Internet reaches 5.4 billion people.  Most of them also use social media. 

To add some more perspective, 

• In 2008, 1.4 billion people were online; in 2015, we were at 3 billion.  Now, that number has almost doubled again. 
• In 2008, Facebook only had 80 million users, and Twitter (now X) had 2 million users.
• In 2008, there were 250 million smartphones, and now there are almost 7 billion of them!

It is mind-blowing to consider what happens each minute on the Internet today.  For example, the 104,000 hours spent on Zoom represents a significant societal shift ... and the over 500 hours of video uploaded to YouTube highlights the incredible amount of content that's being created to share. 

In 2023, the world created approximately 120 zettabytes of data ... which breaks down to approximately 337,000 petabytes of data a day.  Broken down even further, it calculates to more than 15 Terabytes of new data created per person. 

The calculations about what happens in an Internet minute will change rapidly again because of AI.  Consider the amount of computing power and data it takes to power all of these new GPTs. Now, imagine the amount of new data that AI is creating.  Then, try to imagine the challenge we'll have figuring out what's real, what's made up, and what is simply wrong or intentionally misleading.

In addition, as more devices and digital WHOs start creating and sharing data, it's hard to fathom the ramifications and sheer increase in data. 

I'm curious about what the next five years have in store for us as we approach the 40th anniversary of the World Wide Web.