Archive – Page 7 – The Silicon Valley Story

Stop email Spying with MIT, CERN and Harvard’s Encrypted Email

Posted on June 21, 2014

We intercepted phone calls to Chancellor Merkel of Germany last year. We spy on our citizens (Hello NSA). Gmail reads my mail before the recipient. Palantir’s CIA funded guard stop me from taking a pic of the menu of what they eat (posted on a window towards the street).

Augmedix wants to give MD’s Google Glass so they can video you when YOU need to video them instead. More doctors harm patients than patients harm doctors!

It isn’t going to stop – and of course we love all things tech, but the checks and balances have to get in now. Not when the robots are out thinking us – maybe the singularity has already occurred?

To stop the spying you need to step up. You can do it. Look what CERN, MIT and Harvard guys have given us: an awesome email program called ProtonMail.

Help support this encrypted, easy to use email program and take a step to put privacy and respect back in the agenda. Let’s be as awesome in respecting privacy of the people as we are in developing amazing new technology. Watch: PROTON MAIL

Google Glass for Us, Not Them! We Need Them More.

Posted on June 10, 2014

The medical industry may be dangerous to your health.

Medical errors leading to patient death are much higher than previously thought, and may be as high as 400,000 deaths a year, according to a study in the Journal of Patient Safety.

If you dodge the bullets of heart disease and cancer you are poised for the third: your doctor or hospital. (Remember the one you said, “I got the best. All the doctors send their family to him. Only the best.” I grew up in that rarefied atmosphere of Ivy med and ego stroking. These mythical doctors know they are on shaky pedestals even if you don’t.)

This is context, let’s move on because we found a company that wants to make it easier for the third leading cause of death to maintain their operational advantage in wiping you out. If you KNOW a lethal object is in a room or a deadly interaction with a killer might take place, would you hand the cause an easy way to obscure their actions? Of course not. If offered protection would you take it? Of course.

So why is Augmedix being given VC big bucks to help the the third leading cause of death at your expense? Because they pitched it well? Probably. San Francisco based med tech start up Augmedix recently received 3.2 million in funding to rehumanize medicine. How do they plan to accomplish this? By inserting yet more barriers between a person and a health care provider. Google glass for doctors! REALLY??? This is going to RE-humanize the medical industry? Improve the relationship between people and MD’s? The inequality doesn’t jump out at you, reader?

I’ve watched their videos, read their site, seen their angel list video and other than giving the doctor more money (Augmedix says this, not me. It gives the doctor more patients to see in a day), I can’t figure out what the hell this is all about. Ok, the electronic records thing – yes, it’s a horror. So now we have a horror to the nth degree to fix this horror.

The doctor is going to video the consult? Look up drugs? When I get handed Google glass by the gatekeepers, then we begin to re-humanize this interaction. And when the doctor’s Glass is less important than mine, we might be on a path to something real.

I’m horrified at the paternalism taken to the next level. The white coat syndrome is a serious enough problem and giving Google glass to ONLY one half of the equation here is more of the same, RECORDED. Does the person being recorded get the video sent to them? Where is MY GOOGLE GLASS? And I will decide if any other person will wear it in a medical office, not them. We have lost our collective minds and handed them over to the medical industry to highjack, brainwash and manipulate. Oy.

General Medical Technology Voices

When Stereotypes Cause Heart Attacks (gimme that iWatch now!)

Posted on May 28, 2014

DON’T AGE US WITH NEGATIVE STEREOTYPES ON AGING.

Poor Jason Cipriani. He just wanted to write an article about dumbing down your smartphone (!!) for CNET and the wrath of the boomer generation rained on his parade. Looks like a nice guy, married, 3 kids. But seriously:

Grandpa or Grandma, do you like the idea of dumbing down your smartphone? Are you someone who passed up a smartphone you really wanted because you were overwhelmed or intimidated by all the features, so you opted to go with a simple cell phone?

Let’s put this in context: today’s grandparents BROUGHT YOU THE PERSONAL COMPUTER – and the Internet – and the infrastructure to make it all happen. Today’s grandparents surely have some tech phobic or naive amongst them. But so what? There are ways of getting the message across that there is something to minimize the complexity of a smartphone without singling out a group.

Jason – I’m going to help you out here. I’m going to tell you about the research that says negative stereotypes of aging bring on negative health consequences and it is as true for the under 40’s as those over. If you have negative stereotypes of aging at a young age and engage in, “So easy even your grandma can use it” type of thinking it harms you in the future. You don’t age as well. In fact you get heart attacks and strokes more than those without the negative stereotypes. “In the negative group, 25% had cardiovascular events vs 13% of the positive.” The findings were published in the journal Psychological Science in 2009. All usual variables were controlled for. The research was good and conducted at Yale. One of the researchers said positive role models can change attitudes about aging. The article ends with a symposium, “So This is What 90 Looks Like” and mentions a filmmaker who began in her 70’s and is now on her 6th film.

Not everyone can or should or wants to work forever. But no one should be assaulted in the media with stereotypes of anything. And if you want to avoid a heart attack, then here’s your heads up. A gift from me to you, Jason.

This must have been difficult to see the kickback from so many. I was shocked to see so many respond so swiftly and with such a knowledge base from their careers. But then I should not have been. I taught myself Visicalc on the world’s first portable: an Osborne. My only regret is that when I put my first website up back in 1999 or so and sold chocolates with a friend that I didn’t know I was a start up, a CEO, and in search of VC money.

That site is long gone and hello to my peers, and Jason, you’re fantastic writer, this is just a heads up.

Let’s end with a thumbs up to a very old living thing. Here in Palo Ato we have tomorrow’s tech, but we come from this 1000 year old tree Gaspar de Portola camped here, it was the tallest tree and easy for his men to find. Hanging around has its good side. Hope you hang around a very long time.

And to Art Levinson: Go CALICO! (Google’s anti -aging program)

Health Health Medical Technology

Why Google Chose the Name CALICO to Disrupt Aging

Posted on May 13, 2014

Disrupting is the buzz word for game changing tech and Google is disrupting aging. I haven’t heard it used in association with aging before but go ahead Google, disrupt away.

It’s pretty darn awesome to disrupt aging but what does this have to do with the name of this particular moonshot?

Let’s put this on the table: Google says CALICO stands for California Life Company. I don’t think it does.

WHAT IS CALICO?

Calico is the hyper secretive division at Google dedicated to anti-aging run by Art Levinson, former CEO of Genentech. Bill Maris, Founder of Google Ventures was the idea man behind CALICO. Everything in the media about Calico sounds like it was written by PR people and re-cycled by Larry Page, et al. It’s bland verbiage on a very exciting topic.

Why have they been so secretive speaking only in generalities such as “using big data to understand diseases”? I’m sure it is everything from hype to necessity. Make it secretive enough and that makes it exclusive. Talk too much and it dilutes the message and you lose top dog status.

Calico looks dynamic and exciting. The ability to bypass typical funding and lengthy old school research methods and fast track them with millions if not billions in private money and massive computing power is medicine of the future.

So, let’s dive in. It looks like a large part of what Calico is about is silencing genes to increase longevity.

Disrupting aging, increasing longevity, turning off diseases. And powered by private funding, beholden to no one…Google, this is fantastic!

Reasons (clues) why I think genetics and epigenetics (the interaction of environment with genetics) is what Calico is all about:

Genentech’s Art Levinson is a big message that genetics is front and center.

The recent hire of geneticist Cynthia Kenyon from UCSF is a bigger one. Dr. Kenyon was working on anti-aging from the perspective of daf2 or silencing of genes.

What’s that? The important take-away is in red italics.

From Science:

A C. elegans neurosecretory signaling system regulates whether animals enter the reproductive life cycle or arrest development at the long-lived dauer diapause stage. daf-2, a key gene in the genetic pathway that mediates this endocrine signaling, encodes an insulin receptor family member. Decreases in DAF-2 signaling induce metabolic and developmental changes, as in mammalian metabolic control by the insulin receptor. Decreased DAF-2 signaling also causes an increase in life-span. Life-span regulation by insulin-like metabolic control is analogous to mammalian longevity enhancement induced by caloric restriction, suggesting a general link between metabolism, diapause, and longevity.

CALICO CATS. This is the big clue as to what they are doing. Why choose the name Calico? CALICO cats get their color and gender selection issues (almost all calicos are female) because a gene is silenced or not expressed. Calico genetics is a big arena of study.

The unique orange-white-and-black patchwork fur on Calico cats is due to the silencing or inactivation of one of their two X chromosomes. Females have two copies of the X chromosome — one from the mother and one from the father. Only one active X chromosome is required so the second one is turned off.

Calico cats have an orange-fur-color gene on one X chromosomes and a black-fur gene on the other. Silence one and voila! a calico cat.

And we also have a company embedded in, headed by and fueled by geneticists, named CALICO.

If Google’s CALICO program can stop the signaling of an important gene, it can control aging. Kenyon’s lab is following her to Google. They have been very successful in anti-aging work via gene silencing so it makes sense. The domino effect of this work will be phenomenal. Silencing genes will have impact in disease research and expression, and of course, the pharmaceutical companies will charge in with drugs to silence genes.

Google has been primed for genetics research for a long time. Anne Wojcicki’s 23andme is funded by Google Ventures and she is both married and separated to Google co-founder Sergey Brin.

Remember this? See how it ends…with invisibility…

googlecalico The Duel
by Eugene Field (1850-1895)

The gingham dog and the calico cat
Side by side on the table sat;
‘T was half-past twelve, and (what do you think!)
Nor one nor t’ other had slept a wink!
The old Dutch clock and the Chinese plate
Appeared to know as sure as fate
There was going to be a terrible spat.
(I was n’t there; I simply state
What was told to me by the Chinese plate!)

The gingham dog went “Bow-wow-wow!”
And the calico cat replied “Mee-ow!”
The air was littered, an hour or so,
With bits of gingham and calico,
While the old Dutch clock in the chimney-place
Up with its hands before its face,
For it always dreaded a family row!
(Now mind: I ‘m only telling you
What the old Dutch clock declares is true!)

The Chinese plate looked very blue,
And wailed, “Oh, dear! what shall we do!”
But the gingham dog and the calico cat
Wallowed this way and tumbled that,
Employing every tooth and claw
In the awfullest way you ever saw—
And, oh! how the gingham and calico flew!
(Don’t fancy I exaggerate—
I got my news from the Chinese plate!)

Next morning, where the two had sat
They found no trace of dog or cat;
And some folks think unto this day
That burglars stole that pair away!
But the truth about the cat and pup
Is this: they ate each other up!
Now what do you really think of that!
(The old Dutch clock it told me so,
And that is how I came to know.)

General Voices

Apple Geniuses

Posted on May 7, 2014

The new VP of Apple Retail has her work cut out for her – this place looks like a Costco with Walmart Greeters.

But don’t fix what isn’t broken and the GENIUS of the Genius Bar lives on and thrives. And this is coming from the last final moments of a data has to go to fix the drive situation.

Your Genius was all that and more and kudos to him for being good, helpful, and all the other characteristics we have come to expect and which keeps us coming back.

My hd is restoring now and let’s restore the magic that once was an Apple store.

General

Steve Jobs Rollerbladed Here and Neu.Me Co-Shares It with Institute of the Future

Posted on May 5, 2014

Update on Institute for the Future. The last post about them moving into the large space at Hamilton and Emerson brought forth a comment from a reader. I mentioned that in a past life, the space had been Institute for the Past, aka, an antique store. One of the former antique sellers wrote and said:

Steve Jobs used to rollerblade into the store to check it out and take a break from the rollerblading. He would come in with a woman but I don’t know which one she was.

Also in that store, I sold a “United Nations Peace Rose” memorial cup and saucer to Joan Baez. No, not THAT Joan Baez, but her Mother! who was also called Joan Baez! And it was a gift to her daughter Joan Baez, Yes! THAT Joan Baez!

We’d like to thank our reader, Hilda Sendyk, for that information – Steve rollerblading around Palo Alto, and Joan Baez’s mom shopping downtown. And the connection between the two of them is also interesting…Steve and Joan were once lovers and there they both are, in the future Institute for the Future, then full of the past.

And here we are now, Institute for the Future AND.. New ME. I mean neu.me – clever isn’t it? It took me a while to get it, but there it is – neu.me (new me) is co-sharing the space with Institute for the Future. This is the sharing economy and this is it in action. They will share classrooms, open space, etc. The space includes what used to be Diddams also (for a while it was COLOR, bought by Apple, I think). Hmm..looks like Steve was always meant to be in that corner for one reason or the other.

Neu.me looks very, very interesting. They will be training engineers. It isn’t surprising – engineers are the infrastructure of the new tech world thus they are in high demand. I imagine this space is costing a fortune, but educating engineers should be very lucrative. The program looks interesting and the co-sharing with Institute For the Future should be beneficial for both. I only wish Paul Saffo was still there. Rumor has it, and Paul’s cryptic tweet (email?) seems to confirm it, that there was bad blood between Institute of the Future and Paul Saffo.

General

A Bubble in Tech in Palo Alto?

Posted on May 4, 2014

Is there a tech bubble here in Palo Alto and will massive money go poof and the world implode?

(I hope the world of restaurants implodes. Alas, we now have a brunch menu with only one egg dish and it still has the egg white option on that lonely egg dish. (Note to people: Put the damn yolk back in, it has all the nutrients and isn’t the cause of the heart attack you fear.) Lure+Till at The Epiphany has an appealing, fun looking bar/restaurant with a brunch menu that looks like it was designed by the Kale Police. But it doesn’t seem to hurt business so I will be Outlier for Brunch As It Should Be and move on. A drink there looks like fun though. Or bring back Cafe Verona and their incredible, edible egg dishes. Baked eggs with cheese..yum..)

On to The Bubble Machine. The New York Times recently had an article on whether or not there was a bubble in Palo Alto. Reaction is divided. My response (posted on the Times) is clearly on the side of No Bubble.

BUBBLE BUBBLE, TROUBLE and TOIL (letter to editor in online NYT from The Silicon Valley Story)

To call this a bubble is to lack understanding. The enormous societal change going on here is that people with billions in personal monies can fast track ideas that would have taken centuries to occur in any other time. That’s one side. On the other – too many apps that will go nowhere? Yes. Too many dreamers? No such thing. The only bubble here is bubbling enthusiasm, ideas, creativity, and energy. Some is stupid – but so what? Stupid is everywhere. But to ignore the science behind what is changing the world is to think everything is a snapchat. The robotics, the AI, the cloud, big data analytics, the science of IoT, the 23andme’s, the world class researchers being hired by Calico (UCSF geneticist this week went there full time), the 200 med researchers for iWatch – you have to be delusional to think this is a bubble. This is a revolution and we are all part of it. Too many meetups? Maybe. So what. From Homebrew to the singularity, this place is many things, but a bubble it is not. Love to see things fail? Sure, many will, but Larry Page backing research that pharmaceutical companies or private labs could or would never do is akin only to someone funding someone looking for a brave new world. And if you don’t know Calico, Homebrew, singularity or who funded who to find a new world, then find out and we’ll do coffee at Coupa and talk about smart dust and IoT and what it means. I’m looking for someone to write on futurism, and I’ll buy. With bitcoin.

Start Ups

Theranos Finds a Doctor and The Future Arrives in Palo Alto

Posted on April 17, 2014

Institute for the Future is moving into a new home on Hamilton Ave in downtown Palo Alto. They picked a fitting space. It used to be Institute for the Past. Well, not really, but it was an antique store. How cool would it be if they took up the floor where the steps used to be to the huge finished basement and did some tech and futurism interactive activity there. Call it “Walk into the Future” and have some robots. An interactive wall. Grand opening with Scarlett Johannsen (voice of the OS for HER) for starters. Hollywood and tech IS the future, just as porn pushed tech, tech and entertainment push each other. Just ask Mike Judge. Invite Matternet to bring some drones to fly around with cocktails. Buy them with Bitcoins. (Marc Andreeson backs both). We need FUN in tech in downtown Palo Alto. Does anyone remember when we actually had music here? (Jerry Garcia for one, Joan Baez for another.)

What a great space Institute for the Future has picked for a huge cocktail party. If you do have a party, I want an invite. The Silicon Valley Story began in a garage on Addison Ave (That’s HP for those who don’t know) and the Silicon Valley Story continues in a garage on Addison (that would be us). We have a start up in the garage right now in biometrics and we already had one huge massive VC funding when the CEO was living here (not in the garage though). It’s one of the biggies and the reason we are not VC’s is because we did not see the future of what it was to become. We have had another start up founder living here, get Zappos funded and move on to Fortune. (shout out to Scott!). The Silicon Valley story is alive and well in another house and garage on Addison!

I have a soft spot for Institute for the Future because of Paul Saffo. But that’s another story. (One time he was asked to comment about something I did. I’ll tell that story another time.) Alas, he is there no more, and hasn’t been for a while. What a great treat if he were to return. Can’t see it coming to pass. That’s the future I see.

And here’s another story – Theranos, the start up with the little blood tests and the big new building has finally put a medical, not a military, person on the Board. They have added former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. Frist is also a professor of surgery at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Meharry Medical Medical School as well as serving on the boards of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Kaiser, and Harvard Medical School Board of Fellows.

Theranos recently put Riley Bechtel from Bechtel corporation on the Board. Bechtel on the Board makes sense with the military. And Frist makes sense too. I’d have asked Ray Kurzweil but Elizabeth Holmes didn’t ask me for a recommendation. I’d also add Paul Saffo, come to think of it. And my cousin who won a MacArthur Genius Grant.

But it looks like Theranos is building for the international military scene. Walgreens looks like small potatoes in comparison. Come to think of it why doesn’t the Board have a retail person in it? The retail experience at Palo Alto Walgreens has some ups and downs. I went there on a quest: get my blood done. They had told me I could do so with ANY doctor’s orders. I had that. But, they would not send the results to me, only the MD.

Nope. That doesn’t work for me. The person there was incredibly helpful and friendly. She was a good representative for the company. It certainly isn’t her fault I can’t get my results. But, you have to go see the pharmacist first before you go to Theranos. That didn’t sit well with me. No, Theranos is like using Bitcoins at Coupa Cafe. Great idea but not ready for prime time.

But hey, Theranos, congratulations on getting a medical person on the military Board. Of course, he’s embedded with the government but this is not a surprise. N.B. Theranos: People query the engines on this very topic. I know because they find my site asking “why doesn’t Theranos have a doctor on the board?”

Speaking of med tech, everyone here, please check out this site, it is really important for so many. I’m trying to support Mike in this endeavor not because I know him – we only met once – but because I so believe in his app and what it can do. There are children who need this now. Adults too. GO: For Those Who Have No Voice

General Start Ups

How Nice Are We in Silicon Valley? (Mike Judge, I guess we know what u think)

Posted on April 13, 2014

We have meet ups, mentors, peers, hacker houses, VC’s, pitch parties. How about a shout out to someone in New Orleans? And if you want to, let us know how it turns out.

Found on Craigslist

Tech Startup seeking Mentorship

Hi,

I’m a tech entrepreneur in New Orleans, LA seeking insight and advice from individuals involved in tech startups/companies.About me:I’m in the process of launching a mobile app and am interested in expanding my understanding of my startup and its position. I understand this is not conventional; however, please note that rich resources of this nature are not available in New Orleans.I welcome an opportunity to converse with someone over the phone or email about my startup and my own plans to grow the startup. Thank you very much for your consideration!

contact: jstephenbutler@gmail.com

post id: 4418843119
do NOT contact me with unsolicited services or offers

posted: 2 days ago http://sfbay.craigslist.org/pen/com/4418843119.html

email to friend

♥ best of ^[?]

Big Tech Medical Technology

How Much is the iWatch Worth if it Predicts a Heart Attack?

Posted on April 13, 2014

I don’t care if the Apple iWatch comes with a $1K price tag if it predicts a heart attack or comes with Dick Tracy. And I am floored about all the complaints from everyone about the 1K or more price tag IF it does do heart attacks. (Dick Tracy, not so worth 1k.)

To get to the bottom of this I’d have to examine the mentality of people that think out of touch medical care from Obama does anything but raise the cost of health care even more. Free mammograms? Really? This is a good thing? Ok, let’s not go there – just take your anti-oxidants 60 minutes before they radiate your breasts and break your DNA. Your tax dollars paid for space scientists to prove radiation is carcinogenic and cumulative, but for some reason, this goes in one ear and out the other. See them with their DNA tests that proves the damage: EXOGEN

So, what do we have today that will predict a heart attack? Nothing. But we could see a window into probability by going through the following steps: pay for insurance, pay for doctor visit, pay for blood tests, go back to doctor, pay for doctor, get on drugs that cause major damage (statins) , go back to doctor, get sent to nutritionist, get more blood tests, blah, blah…BTW, your doctor is paid to tell you to stop smoking. So, the cost of predicting a heart attack is..well, no one can do it, so the costs are never ending because they keep doing the wrong things expecting a crystal ball answer. But if you have a really educated (not just trained) doctor, you just might get the right blood test.

This is it: (from plactest.com)

Lp-PLA₂ Activity is a Unique Marker
The PLAC Test for Lp-PLA₂ Activity helps predict risk for atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease through a simple blood test. It measures the enzyme activity of Lp-PLA₂ (lipoprotein-associated phospholipase A₂), a vascular-specific inflammatory marker produced by macrophages and implicated in the formation of rupture-prone plaque. The majority of all heart attacks and strokes are caused by plaque rupture and thrombosis (clots) – not stenosis (narrowing of arteries).

The PLAC Test Helps Identify Hidden Risk
Lp-PLA₂ is an independent risk marker to be used in conjunction with clinical evaluation and patient risk assessment as an indicator of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Published data suggests patients with higher values of Lp-PLA₂ have an increased risk for CVD. In the Lancet 2010 published meta-analysis, a 10% increase risk for CHD per SD increase of Lp-PLA₂ activity was comparable to the risk profile of 2 well established risk markers, non-HDL cholesterol and blood pressure.

The cost, I don’t know for you. It is $175.00 at Life Extension or $93 if you are a member. Your lab and or doctor will of course have its own price. This price is when you want to order it on your own, go through Life Extension and use Lab Corps for the blood draw. I checked with Theranos, the discount blood labs, and they don’t even offer it. see our posts on Theranos, The Almost Great Palo Alto Start Up.

If you want you can keep spending health care dollars over and over and over and over – Obamacare, boutique MD’s, private lab tests, more lab tests, and I suspect you’ve spent 1K in a nanosecond.

Or, you could wear your iMED or iCU (my suggested names) aka iWatch and be told when the heart attack is coming. Am I suggesting this take the place of blood tests? Of course not. Take the place of a doctor? Don’t get me going on that one.

Health care is redundant, expensive, outdated, and often a disaster. Now that it is in the hands of the government, it is more redundant, expensive, outdated and disastrous.

Personal note to APPLE: my father died at 58 of a heart attack. His brother died on the beach of a heart attack (age unknown). And my PLAC test numbers aren’t very good – only good news is high HDL but that may be meaningless with my PLAC numbers. So, get that heart attack thing on your iThing and put a 1K price tag on it if that is what it takes and when it saves lives, maybe insurance will pay for it if we can’t get rid of insurance first. (Yes, I am a dreamer – but so is Project X at Google with Calico. I’m ready.)

So, hell, yes, Tim et al, I want the $1000 thing that tells me if a heart attack is coming.

The rest of you can wear your Timex or Rolex and pay your insurance and co-pays and drug bills and lab tests and doctor visits.

And you have sleep researchers working on this thing? Ok, I need it yesterday.

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