The Week the World Changed

It was an odd week, between the devastating Los Angeles fires and Mark Zuckerberg burning the US government censorship apparatus to the ground. Or at least sent up a few smoke signals, and where there’s smoke…
We’re not going to get into the politics of the fire. There’s certainly enough on that out there. This is about tech. While it was reported that the reservoir and fire hydrants were empty, isn’t California the jewel in the crown of technology? And there is technology out there to combat water shortages and fires. Los Angeles is built on a desert. Before you put a major city in place, good idea to consider the water problem, which self-train civil engineer William Mulholland did back re Los Angeles in the day (think the movie Chinatown), but the city has since then greatly expanded and water shortages are not a rarity in Southern California. In Israel, which is also built on a desert, measures were put in place to ensure that water would get to where it was needed in order to support the population: How Israel’s Water Surplus Is TRANSFORMING the Middle East. It’s basic urban planning.
Cloud-seeding has brought rain to the otherwise parched Middle East, and while there is some debate about whether or not the science was responsible for the flooding in Dubai last year, well, that is the only incident of flooding/water manipulation in the desert, the parting of the Red Sea in Exodus aside, but that’s literally another story.
Or there’s simpler, less invasive science, California, land of tech, and why doesn’t “The US have this technology? China has fire-extinguishing drones!” We wonder what happened to this technology, which was reported on back in 2022: “Game changing,” Central Coast company unveils firefighting drone. “The aircraft weighs 100 pounds and can reach speeds of 70 to 100 miles per hour while carrying cargo that weighs its own mass,” ksbw reported.
As a nod to the conspiracy theorists out there, okay, we’ll play, but just this once: LA fires clear the way for SmartLA 2028 and 2028 LA Olympics.
And it needs to be said: with the homes/buildings burning, including all that PVC piping, dioxins are being released into the air and the soil. They’re “highly toxic and can cause cancer” et al, according to the EPA website. And note that neither the EPA nor any Cali-based agency is currently testing the soil or air, but we felt compelled to make that public service announcement.
Mark Zuckerberg did the media circuit last week and Zuckerberg Declares War on Censorship (Not Really Though), as Ken Klippenstein reported. “Zuckerberg announced his plan for “restoring free expression on our platforms,” going as far as saying “the US government has pushed for censorship.” A review of Meta’s newly updated policies, however, reveals that the changes are largely cosmetic. Many continue to evince the same deference to government wishes that Zuckerberg claims to be fighting against, like Meta’s ongoing blanket ban on “information obtained from hacked sources” regardless of whether it’s newsworthy. Said Axios, “Zuckerberg on Rogan: Facebook’s censorship was “something out of 1984,” where he “criticized the Biden administration for pushing for censorship around COVID-19 vaccines, the media for hounding Facebook to clamp down on misinformation after the election, and his own company for complying.”
Um, you were originally funded by the investment arms of the NSA and CIA, Zuck, so was your compliance with those dictates really that unexpected? As we constantly remind founders, not all investment money is the same. Always consider the source and their possible agenda, present or future. Also, didn’t you donate $400M to the campaign of the president whom you said “Pressured Facebook on Censorship?”
“I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it,” (said Zuckerberg). “I also think we made some choices that, with the benefit of hindsight and new information, we wouldn’t make today,” National Review reported.
In hindsight? “I still think it’s good for more people to get the vaccine… I think that they [the government] had a kind of goal that they thought was in the interests of the country. And the way they went about it, I think, violated the law,” he recently told Joe Rogan. Meanwhile, there’s this Leaked Video Of Mark Zuckerberg Warning His Staff Not To Take A COVID Vaccine
So, has Zuckerberg now changed his spots? Considering that Meta Cracks Down on Internal Dissent Against Appointment of UFC’s Dana White to Board, as Gizmodo reported, might want to think again. Meanwhile, for those of us who enjoy connecting the dots, Meta’s AI Profiles Are Indistinguishable From Terrible Spam That Took Over Facebook “Meta executive Connor Hayes told the Financial Times that the company is going to roll out AI character profiles on Instagram and Facebook that “exist on our platforms, kind of in the same way that accounts do … they’ll have bios and profile pictures and be able to generate and share content powered by AI on the platform.” This quote got a lot of attention because it was yet another signal that a “social network” ostensibly made up of human beings and designed for humans to connect with each other is once again betting its future on distinctly inhuman bots designed with the express purpose to pollute its platforms with AI-generated slop, just like spammers are already doing and just like Mark Zuckerberg recently told investors (“The AI-generated content will continue until morale improves“) the explicit plan is. In the immediate aftermath of the Financial Times story, people began to notice the exact types of profiles that Hayes was talking about, and assumed that Meta had begun enacting its plan.”
What a great way to influence people and opinions, without having to be accused of anything so Twentieth Century as censorship and manipulation. Same playbook, different day.
The LA fires should be a wakeup call in terms of preparedness, especially considering California’s long history of wildfires and the state’s lack of attention to basic forestry. And speaking of casting caution to the wind, Andreessen Horowitz Wants to Shoehorn AI Into Everything in 2025. Whether You Want It or Not “Waves of hype have been unleashed on the public since ChatGPT’s unveiling in 2022. And investors have no intention of slowing down,” Inc reported. And having learned nothing, Zuckerberg seems to be fully on board.
AI has its place in the world, but we already know that “AI Has Already Become a Master of Lies And Deception,” Science Alert reported. Caution must be taken before we allow it to be shoehorned into every system and every vertical. As a heads up re AI everywhere all at once, if last week’s events in Los Angeles taught us nothing else, it’s that wildfires have a tendency to burn out of control, and even once contained, the landscape is never the same. Onward and forward.