Film Review: Black Mirror Series Five (Part 2/3)

This next story, Smithereens, is set in the UK - London, to be exact. Smithereen is the name of a Social Media company owned by Billy Bauer.

As the exclamation mark icon would suggest, Smithereen produces some kind of Twitter-like Social Media product.

The Premise

Rideshare driver Chris Gilhaney takes a man hostage in an effort to speak with the founder of Smithereen, Billy Bauer. That's pretty much it; this is, in broad strokes, what takes place. The rest of it is in-character drama and backstory.

The tragedy itself is a commentary on the addictve nature of Social Media.

The Characters

Andrew Scott as Christopher Gilhaney. At first we think he's an unkempt cab driver with an unusually intense stare. We later find out that he's extremely stressed and has a hair-trigger temper, but ultimately a decent chap at heart. He's also got a fair amount of tragedy in his life which leads him to do this.

Damson Idris plays Smithereen intern Jaden Tommins as a scared kid taken hostage. He does this wonderfully too, and really elicits sympathy here. At the end, the character exhibits loads of empathy with his kidnapper Chris and even tries to stop him from killing himself.

Topher Grace as Smithereen CEO Billy Bauer. Grace appears like I've never seen him before - as a new-agey man-bunned hipster out on a "silent retreat". Pretensions aside, he's entirely sympathetic as a tech geek who begins building his product with benign intentions but ends up creating a monster.

Calum Callaghan as male cop, Damien Cullen. Slightly goofy, but the portrayal of a stodgy cop seemed entirely authentic.

Ambreen Razia as female cop, Najma Haque. Portrayed as the more on-the-ball and alert partner.

Amanda Drew is Hayley Blackwood. She is a grieving mother whose daughter took her own life, and has a one-night stand with Chris. I liked her in this role, but I'm not sure if her inclusion was necessary at all.

Caitlin Innes Edwards as Hannah Kent from Smithereen HR. Nothing much to see here, really. Honestly didn't do much. I get that the plot warranted her inclusion; she just wasn't that interesting to watch.

Maggie Bain as Maryam, who appears to be in charge of Smithereen in London. Another superfluous role.

Ruibo Qian as Penelope Wu, COO. She acts as the counterfoil to Billy Bauer's empathetic nature, mostly cold and calculating and concerned with the less human side of things.

Monica Dolan as Chief Superintendent Linda Grace, who tries to take charge but does a really bad job of it.

Daniel Ings as David Gilkes, negotiator. Another role that felt superfluous.

Quincy Dunn-Baker as Don from legal and Mirirai Sithole as Shonelle from Analytics. Fucking superfluous. FFS, they should have just combined the two roles with no loss to the story. Were they trying to set some kind of record here?

Jorge Cordova as Ernesto Cruz from FBI. Wow, this is Superfluous with a capital S. What did the character contribute here, really? Neat pornstache, though.

Adam McNamara as Harris the sniper. Alice Bailey-Johnson as the other sniper. Supremely incompetent at their jobs, considering how much they missed and how little distance it was.

Crystal Clarke does a decent job playing Tipi. Upbeat and earnest. Clarke made the most out of the limited scope of the role as the staff member sent to alert Billy Bauer.

The Mood

It looks like a typical dreary day in London but soon (after an unneccessary sex scene) the action picks up and becomes some kind of hostage thriller. Doubles as tragedy when one realizes what led Chris to take such extreme measures.

What I liked

I really enjoyed the fact that this episode was all about existing tech. Smithereen was like a real-world Twitter (now X), Persona the equivalent of Facebook or Instagram, and Hitcher like Uber. It made it all the more relatable, especially since the bleakness was a dark (or black, hur hur) mirror to the all-too-real ills of Social Media today.

The transcriber being a prude as it recorded Chris delivering a cluster F-bomb, substituting all instances of "fuck" with "duck". I probably shouldn't find it that amusing, but I did.

What I didn't

The cast just felt unnecessarily huge. There was a number of speaking roles in the episode that felt like they were there just to make up the numbers. The characterization for these roles were just flat.

The plot was bloated beyond belief. A lot of it felt like meaningless waiting. Did it ratchet up the tension? Maybe a little. But not enough to warrant sitting through a whole lot of stuff that could have been cut out.

For example, Hayley's subplot. Near the end, we see that Billy Bauer has called in to Persona to request that they give Hayley her daughter's password. But anyone who works in tech (or even has the faintest idea how this shit works) knows that passwords have not been stored in cleartext since the last decade. Basic web security. There is no way for anyone to go into the database and search for a user and simply retrieve a non-hashed password. The best they could have done was reset the password or send Hayley a link to do so.

Now, normally I could have overlooked this... if it weren't for the fact that this password was a plot point (the password apparently matched the number of the boat in a photo that Hayley and her daughter took together), which resulted in the password thing being a gigantic fucking plot hole.

Cut out this entirely, and we would have eliminated Hayley and her one night stand with Chris -and- the plot hole. Though it would have been a pity because I actually liked Amanda Drew as Hayley.

All in all, this amateurish error ruined the episode for me. You want to make a show about tech, get a writer who actually understands tech. Jesus!

Conclusion

A poor, poor episode, especially since it could have been halfway decent once a lot of fat was trimmed. I liked the premise and the Aesop of the episode, but the huge plot hole and execution flaws made this one just about unsalvageable.

My Rating

4.5 / 10

Next

Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too

Meta ditches the fact-checkers

Meta started off 2025 with a grand announcement in early January. CEO Mark Zuckerberg, sporting a new luscious mop of hair, declared that Facebook and Instagram would be dialling back on fact-checking and content moderation operations. In recent years, Facebook's moderation policies have been met with mixed reactions due to allegedly Left-leaning biases within the fact-checking. 

What it effectively meant was that if your Facebook posts have ever received a warning for saying things that the fact-checkers considered offensive or untrue, you were about to no longer be in danger of that. In particular, if you were of the Right-leaning persuasion, you might find your content no longer under scrutiny or censored in the name of "preventing the spread of misinformation".

Censored by Facebook.

I've never had much of a problem with that censorship. It's annoying when it happens, sure, but I don't get censored much. Mostly because being Singaporean, I tend to post things that don't actually make sense in English. The thing about having your own slang in a multi-cultural country is that you tend to go that way when feeling particularly strongly about something. In other words, we Singaporeans can be offensive in multiple languages, not just one. Go, us!

And also because I don't go onto Facebook or Instagram to look for Right-leaning opinions. Or Left-leaning ones, for that matter. These platforms just don't represent that kind of value for me. I'm more about the DIY and origami videos

Motivations

Mark Zuckerberg is a highly accomplished man, but with this move, even by his lofty standards, he achieved something truly remarkable. In a country where deep political divisions exist, he's managed to turn both the Left and the Right sides of the political aisle against him. Many on the Left think that he's a turncoat who sold out by adopting this bend-the-knee approach towards Donald Trump. On the Right, there's a sentiment that someone with no principles, who could abandon his stand just like that just because Donald Trump is the one soon to be in power, can't be trusted.

And both sides, of course, in not so many words, accuse Zuckerberg of trimming his sails in response to the directions the political winds blow in the USA.

Trimming their sails.

Honestly, from my privileged position of not caring a whit about the outcome of the culture wars in the USA, I fail to see the problem. 

Sure, Zuckerberg said this.

What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas, and it's gone too far. So, I want to make sure that people can share their beliefs and experiences on our platforms.

As far as I'm concerned, no matter how he may pontificate to the contrary, Zuckerberg has never been a champion for Free Speech. The mere thought elicits a chuckle. Zuckerberg's a businessman, first and foremost, and if it takes a certain amount of ass-kissing (even if said posterior belongs to a certain Donald J Trump) to get ahead, so be it. Zuckerberg isn't betraying anything or embracing some virtue. As a business owner, his first duty isn't to Free Speech - and if he's ever given you a different impression, I'm afraid that's on you - but to business. He's simply doing the sensible thing for Meta.

So what if Zuckerberg's only doing this because Donald Trump won the election? So what if he's only trying to ensure Meta survives at least till the next election four years later? What else is he supposed to do, sacrifice his business for high-minded ideals that some randos on the internet like to squawk about?

The plan is to move the moderation team to Texas. Assuming that the majority of the existing team can't simply just uproot themselves, the result would be some kind of voluntary mass resignation. Considering that Zuckerberg recently talked about replacing programmers in Meta with AI by this year, I think it's safe to assume that there's a drive to reduce headcount at Meta that ties in nicely with the move to Texas. That would represent significant cost savings for Meta, if nothing else.

What next for Meta?

The CEO of X, one Linda Yaccarino, congratulated Meta on the change. 

I think it’s really exciting when you think about community notes being good for the world... and it couldn’t be more validating than to see that Mark and Meta realize that. Mark, Meta, welcome to the party.

Welcome to the party? Geez.

This may be due to me being Asian, coming from a culture that normalizes sarcasm and therefore being suspicious of everything, including (and especially) things that sound like compliments. But it feels like some serious shade is being thrown here. She might as well have said "welcome to the twenty-first century!".

Twitter-shaped shade
disguised as a Like.

That aside, I would like to address another thing Zuckerberg said.

We tried in good faith to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth, but the fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they've created, especially in the US.

Jesus, what was his first clue?!

Anyway, what does this change for Facebook? People have been attempting to push their political and ideological agendas on Social Media for over a decade now. It's just not that big a deal any more. You can throw all the Left or Right-leaning content in peoples' faces all day; you're not converting anyone. All it will probably accomplish is that now Facebook is no longer a Leftist echo chamber, people are just going elsewhere to find more suitable echo chambers. But absolutely no one is going to be coming onto Facebook in search of the truth.

In the larger picture, I'm not sure if anyone lets themselves be influenced by Social Media any more. To what end? Social Media is filled with people who are, in all likelihood, just as ignorant and unenlightened as everyone else. Anyone who's actually looking to have their opinions shaped by Social Media, is probably not playing with a full deck in the first place. To say nothing of the sort who have maybe a few thousand Followers and think their constant political posts on Social Media make any kind of difference.

Come to think of it, now with A.I coming up, we won't even need all these users anymore. Speak complete rubbish with utmost confidence? A.I can do that, and much faster too!

Ultimately...

One half of the USA is feeling great about the change, and the other half is feeling pretty sore. This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but none of that matters. For Meta's Social Media business, the writing was on the wall a long time ago. I see them becoming progressively less relevant. They'll always have a place in history, but in four to eight years, this may be exactly all they have left.

Facts man, facts!
T___T

TeochewThunder: Year Nine (Part 2/2)

Much of this blogging year's content was strong. Few made it to extreme highs in terms of readership, or broke existing records. On the other hand, plenty of them garnered a respectable amount of views.

Red hot

Those posts in this category simply reinforce my point that it is my views about politics and the workplace, rather than my tech, that get the most attention.

Damn, that's hot.

Quiet Quitting: Do Or Do Not? examined the phenomenon of Quiet Quitting in the workplace.

Film Review: Black Mirror Series Three was a surprise - I didn't know people were that interested in a series that isn't even all that recent. It definitely overperformed.

The Real Reason Behind Political Resignation rode upon the wave of awareness generated by the recent (at the time) scandals in the Singapore Government.

Remote Work Is A Moral Issue For Elon Musk was basically me roasting the world's douchiest techbro millionaire. I don't know why, but people seem to pay more attention to these. That's sad.

Decent

These got a fair amount of attention - some of which was expected, and some which weren't.

Well done!

That Sinking Feeling At Twitter was a post talking about Elon Musk and Twitter (now X) and this always gets attention.

Film Review: M3GAN, Film Review: Missing, Film Review: Black Mirror Series Two and Film Review: Black Mirror Series Three, Redux were film reviews and these usually do well. No real surprise here.

Five New Workplace Buzzwords, Does Skin Art Affect Your Career Prospects?, What we think we deserve, does not matter, On job applicants who want work-life balance, Didn't get that promotion? Blame The Peter Principle and It's Not Personal were some of my views on the workplace. Could have done better, but I'm not complaining.

ChatGPT's capabilities and their implications in Software Development, Big Tech Layoffs in Progress!, From Twitter to X? and  TikTok Congressional Hearing: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly were about recent tech developments. I honestly expected these to do better, especially the last one. I mean, I worked really hard on the TikTok Congressional Hearing. Oh, well.

The How And Why Of One-Hot Encoding and Let's Unpack The CSS Box got a surprising amount of attention. I've never labored under the delusion that people bother about my more technical posts.

A Software Developer's Vacation in Kuala Lumpur was a WTF moment for me when I saw it had gotten this many views. I really wasn't under the impression that people care about my vacations, or about Kuala Lumpur. 

Meh

These were the underperformers. The ones that I expected a better reader reception for, and just didn't get it. Thankfully, there's not that many of them.

What a letdown.

Meta's new platform: Threads or Threat? now this one definitely underperformed. I don't know why.

Five Java Exceptions Personified was a fun listicle that bombed. I had higher hopes for this one.

Here's to Year Nine!

The blog has survived. It's often on life support, but it's there. I haven't been a huge success, but that was never the goal. The goal was to build muscle memory, keep me sharp, help me stay current and relevant. And on that front, it's worked wonders.

On cloud nine,
T___T

Ten Awesome Tech Tattoos

Tattoos are a common sight in society these days. I recently saw a nice tattoo on some random middle-aged housewives, and then it hit me: it's not that housewives are suddenly finding it hip to ink their bodies. It's more like these were the rebellious teenagers from a couple decades back, now all grown up and shit. Heck, I'm no spring chicken. But that's neither here nor there.

Tech tattoos, on the other hand, should really occupy their own niche. The ones I managed to find in cyberspace are clever, quirky and just awesome.

1. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish

We begin with a nice nod to the late great Steve Jobs. This is one of his more well-known quotes.

From IJustWanaShine.

Now I'm not a big fan and this isn't anything I would ever do. But come on, this is classy. And inspirational, to boot.

2. HTML Code

For all web devs out there, this is not just HTML code, it's a clever pun!

From Lambatest

It would actually take someone in the know to appreciate that joke; however, it's relatively easy to implement. Again, not one of those things I would totally do, but I appreciate the intent.

3. Linux Command

For those familiar with Linux, this line basically means "recursively delete all files and directories without asking for confirmation". In other words, remove everything without regret.

From louiseann93

The sentiment behind simplifying your life is one I can get behind. The fact that this dude has it inked into his forearm gave me pause. Is he saying he can remove your life with one punch?

4. Binary

This guy has his name "MIKE" tattooed in binary.

From TattooViewer

Not a bad idea, but if you had a seriously long ass name, that might present a problem.

5. 404

Nothing to see here, move along. That's the message I got.

From Pinterest

The woman in question has it on her bosom. It could be her way of saying "my eyes are up here", but it might just send a cheekier message. Like, "titsheart not found".

6. More Binary!

Ooh! Now this one is nice. Not only is it binary, it's taking the shape of one of my favorite childhood memories!

From Tattoodo

Plus, it's in monochrome. I love tats like that.

7. Paper Clip

This is another memory, albeit not quite so fond.

From
JavaScript in Plain English

If anyone ever had the misfortune of using Microsoft Word when it was featuring this annoying little mascot, they'd know what I'm talking about. It's a nice idea, but I can't see myself wanting this fella be a permanent part of me.

8. Docker

Now this is dedication. Is it a DevOps thing to ink the whale icon of Docker in their skin? That's amusing.

From Twitter

Then again, I have Liverpool FC's motto inked into my knuckles, so who am I to talk?

9. WiFi

I appreciate anyone who has the WiFi icon tattooed on them. Not that they can actually provide WiFi, but they can at least relate to its importance.

From Tattoodo

This fella has it on his middle finger. I can just imagine someone asking him for WiFi, and his response...

10. IBM

Again, dedication. This time, to a tech company. Honestly, I'm not totally behind this one. Unless you own the company in question, this just seems superfluous to me. Companies are where you work and get paid, and after you're gone from there, you're gone.

From Flickr

In addition, if I had to pick an IBM tattoo, I would not have gone for this one. I would have gone for the far cleverer rebus option. An eye, a bee and an M.

Conclusion

There you go, folks! Ten cool (and some not that cool but nevertheless thought-provoking) tech tattoos. Any strike your fancy?

I ink, therefore I am,
T___T

From Twitter To X?

It appears that Elon Musk has come up with yet another bizarre decision. Sometime last week, Twitter underwent a name and logo change. Now, name changes aren't anything new in the world we inhabit. Facebook became Meta. Bruce Jenner became Caitlyn Jenner. In 1993, Prince became... well, you get the idea. Nothing to blink at.

Bye bye, birdy.

What's surprising, at least to me, is the what. From an internationally known moniker, the app has changed to a relatively generic X. The cute and tasteful blue bird that has served as the app's logo for more than a decade, is now a stylized and, dare I say, uninteresting "X". Now, not being a tech billionaire and all, nobody really cares about my opinion, and nor should they. I assume Elon Musk knows what he's doing... because I really don't. And I'm not entirely sure anyone else does either. Of all changes to take place, this stands out as a strange choice.

They call it a rebranding, but it really feels more like a debranding.

While I've never been a Twitter user, Twitter was such a mainstay of cyberspace that it was impossible for it to not be on my radar in some fashion. That's how strong its branding was. To throw that all away for a new but not altogether exciting image, seems counter-intuitive.

Burning questions!

Elon Musk has stated his desire to evolve Twitter into some kind of "Everthing App", just like WeChat. Something like that would require strong brand recognition as a foundation. Unfortunately, we live in a world where many things already share the name "X". And some of these things are distinctively pornographic in nature. Is that the kind of recognition that Elon Musk is going for? Somehow I doubt it.

Twitter's presence in not just cyberspace, but also Internet culture at large, has resulted in certain words being added to the lexicon. "Tweeting" is a verb which essentially means posting a message on Twitter. Now with the name change, what other changes could we see? Will Tweeting now be known as X-ing? Sounds uncomfortably violent.

Let me just do some X-ing...

Finally, of all the icons that Elon Musk could have gone with, why this one? I called it "relatively generic" earlier. I was being kind. It's boring. It's tepid. It says nothing about what the platform does. This could be deliberate. Musk could have some big plans for the app, and perhaps this generic quality is meant to avoid painting the app into a corner.

In Conclusion

With Meta's Threads encountering a bit of a downturn in recent weeks, this looked like a good time for Twitter to recover. Looks like it's not to be.

Still, it's going to be interesting seeing the two platforms taking turns to flounder. Definitely way more interesting than seeing one platform dominate. Let's hope that this does not lead to Elon Musk going from X owner to ex-owner. (hur hur)

Kick some X, Elon Musk!
T___T

Meta's new platform: Threads or Threat?

I've never wanted a Twitter account. Back in the day, the thought of maintaining yet another extension of my online identity held little appeal, especially when all I could seemingly expect in return was yet another platform of celebrities airing opinions that they seemed to think I should care about, or non-celebs making those proclamations as though they were celebs. And, of course, thread after thread of shmucks with too much time on their hands people trying desperately to sound cleverer than the next guy, or just outright hurling verbal abuse when they thought they could get away with it.

Heck, if that was what I was after, I already had Facebook for that.

Thus, last week, when I saw an Instagram notification that told me some of my friends had already started posting on Meta's spanking brand new Social Media platform Threads, I was momentarily tempted to just hop on the bandwagon. Momentarily. Until I did a little homework and it turned out that Threads was basically a spiritual clone of Twitter less a few features.

Now, if I already had zero desire to have a Twitter account whether or not Elon Musk was in charge, why would I want Threads?

The case for Threads

The ad-free experience? Come on, now. We all know that once Threads hits a certain critical mass in terms of user base, Mark Zuckerberg is going to monetize the hell out of it. It's just business.

More moderation, less toxicity? Sure, right now Threads is a nice friendly place with content moderation. However, once enough users join this platform, the same thing is going to happen that happens everywhere - the name-calling, the endless virtue-signalling, the constant pseudo-intellectual bullshit. People are trash, and they don't stop being trash even if you intend to implement a level of censorship that would cause China to sigh with approval.

Censored!

It's also tempting to sign up for Threads just to spite Elon Musk, though in all honesty, a lot of that is his own fault. This techbro billionaire basically paints a target on himself every time he gets online to spout some outrageously trollish bullshit. He's a billionaire and the average Keyboard Warrior can't even begin to touch him... but they can affect his bottom line and dent his ego by going over to his competitor now that he has one. I like to think I'm above these levels of pettiness, though the simple fact is that my laziness precludes me from it.

Competition is good for the market, generally. Threads represents just that. Some might say we already have way too many Social Media platforms. I say that's only the case if one intends to sign up for all of them. As someone whose fortunes aren't being intrinsically tied to public recognition - such as, say, actors and artistes and influencers - I have the privilege of not giving a shit, one which I intend to exercise with extreme prejudice.

But back to the issue of competition. It's important to keep these guys in check. And if the world's governments can't, perhaps these competing platforms will keep each other in check. Think about it - even without a monopoly, platforms like Facebook, Twitter and the like were abusing data confidentiality and unevenly applying moderation policies. How much bolder would they get if they had a monopoly? That, my friends, is entirely unthinkable.

The case against Threads

I don't actually have anything against Threads specifically. At least, not any more than I have against Twitter and all the platforms that attempt to imitate it. It just doesn't offer me any value that would entice me to partake; I have no ambitions to become an influencer of any sort, and I certainly don't think my opinions require a Twitter-like soapbox to air them from.

Why, Zuck?!

But sure, let's take a look at the data that Threads wants to collect. That's quite a list: location, personal, health financial, web browsing... check out the screenshot, or check it out yourself on your App Store. Even by the standards of Social Media, this seems excessive. Now, being a complete nobody, I'm personally not all that concerned about data privacy. People who feel differently about the issue may beg the question: why in the ever-loving Zuck do you need all that data, Mark? Sure, these are mostly optional. But still, it's a little concerning.

There's also the issue of your Instagram account being tied to your Threads account. Apparently, once you install Threads, you can't delete your Threads account without also deleting your Instagram account, which just feels really tyrannical. I expect them to fix this at some point, though.

Lastly, there's the buzz that Threads lacks certain features that Twitter has, such as Trends and Spaces. But let's not kid ourselves, all people really need is a platform to air their opinions, exchange news of dubious veracity and argue with complete strangers. You don't need those extra features for that.

So... Threads or Threat?

Whatever one may think of Meta or Mark Zuckerberg, the move to create Threads and attract the Instagram user base was nothing short of brilliant. Already, Threads has unsurpassed rapidity of user growth and avoided (sort of) the growing pains of most other Social Media platforms. It came at an crucial time when Elon Musk seems to be struggling as Twitter's owner, and his increasingly unpopular decisions have left Twitter's user base crying out for an alternative.

Will Threads be Twitter's death blow? I sure hope not. Not that I'm a fan of either Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk, but the last thing we need in the Social Media arena is a monopoly. The existence of a flailing Twitter has given rise to the creation of Threads, and the existence of Threads should in turn hold Musk's feet to the fire. Already, we have news of an impending lawsuit. Good times!

Thread carefully, Elon Musk!
T___T

Remote Work Is A Moral Issue For Elon Musk

Elon Musk, tech entrepreneur and Twitter fratbro extraordinaire is at it again. Just last week, during an interview with CNBC, in addition to his usual spiel about productivity in the office, he opined the following, while putting on the most snicker-inducing look of put-upon indignation ever.

It's like, really, you're going to work from home and you're going to make everyone else who made your car come work in the factory? You're going to make the people who make your food… that they can't work from home? The people that fix your house - they can't work from home? But, you can? Does that seem morally right? That's messed up.

People should get off their goddamn moral high horse with the work-from-home bullshit. They're asking everyone else to not work from home while they do.

The laptop class are living in la-la land.

Make no mistake, there are parts I agree with. Remote work is not, and should not be, an entitlement. I would even be OK with his argument that people are more productive in the office, because there are some cases where that's true. But the rest of the argument? There's no way to be nice about it: framing it as a moral issue is jaw-droppingly stupid, devoid of any coherent logic whatsoever.

I feel like the flaws are evident enough that I shouldn't have to address them, but here we go anyway.

Dismantling the "moral" argument

Before we begin, I should just state that I do work remotely, with days spent in the office when it becomes absolutely necessary. However, it's more of a perk than any sort of entitlement. And while I may have the occasional day where I just can't seem to get much work done, I also have them in the office. Not working in Silicon Valley probably excludes me from the "laptop class" that Elon Musk is taking such pains to dump on, though.

I'm not sure what "make everyone else work in the factory" means. I have neither the authority nor wherewithal to make anyone do anything. If they have to work in the office, that is the nature of their job, and me working from home or office or planet Mars does nothing to change that. Thus, that part already is perplexing in its sheer absurdity.

Working from outer space.

As for "the people who make your food… that they can't work from home? The people that fix your house - they can't work from home? But, you can? Does that seem morally right? That's messed up.", let's try to justify that statement.

How about we say, "you're going to buy Twitter but you're gonna make the rest of us pay eight dollars to get a blue check on our accounts? We can't buy Twitter, but you can? Does that seem morally right? That's messed up."?

Did that make sense? No, it didn't make a lick of sense. Consequently, neither does his argument.

Lastly, morality is subjective. Trying to introduce a subjective component into a business decision (I assume that the issue of remote work is a business decision for people like Elon Musk, but you can never tell these days) is doomed to failure. Just because you feel that something is immoral doesn't make it immoral for the rest of the world. Guess who needs to get off their moral high horse?

He said what he said, but why?

Normally, if it had been anyone else who uttered this, the first thing I would have wondered was, how did this moron manage to tie his shoelaces in the morning, much less make it to a CNBC interview? But this is Elon Musk, yo. He is the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, both huge enterprises. He's one of the world's richest men, and while wealth is no indication of IQ, let's just say that I highly doubt that the Elon Musk is an idiot of that magnitude.

In other words, there's no way he's that big a jackass. So let's get that out of the way.

The easiest (and probably laziest) explanation is that he was high when he made these comments. Gotta lay off the weed, bro.

A more charitable interpretation is that Elon Musk does truly have something against remote work and he let his emotions get the better of his logic. He wouldn't be the first, millionaire genius status notwithstanding.

Look at me!

The last, and unfortunately most believable explanation is that it doesn't matter what Elon Musk believes, he's going to say whatever gets him the most eyeballs. Years of watching Elon Musk make an absolute monkey of himself on Social Media has driven me to the conclusion that the man's a bit of an attention junkie.

I think he's playing to a certain gallery. It's extremely unlikely that people who work from home are going to listen to that largely performative rant and tearfully repent of their immoral ways, thus I can only speculate that he is courting the attention of Boomer Bosses very traditional-minded employers.

Finally

There are no absolutes where remote work is concerned. It's not inherently good or bad. It is merely one possible component in an employer-employee relationship. Tech workers work with software, therefore remote work is a distinct possibility. Not so much for others.

And no, I don't think even Elon Musk truly believes that it is a moral issue.

But whatever, guys. I'm done. An entire blogpost devoted to this, is already more attention from me than the man deserves. Points for effort, though. He certainly had me going.

Signing off from home,
T___T

Big Tech Layoffs In Progress!

Microsoft. Google. Amazon. Apple. FacebookMeta. Twitter. What do all these companies have in common? They're big tech, and since last year, they have been engaging in massive layoffs. Ostensibly, this came about because they all massively overhired in preparation for a tech boom that did not come to pass. And now that reality has hit, these companies are jettisoning employees like it's going out of fashion.

Microsoft has announced huge cuts. So has Amazon. And if you recall me discussing the situation at Twitter, that was just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

Getting dumped by Facebook.

Google and Meta have not been slacking in that department either. Sundar Pichai and Mark Zuckerberg, respectively, went on record to say, that they "take full responsibility for this decision"  and take "full responsibility for the decisions that led us here". I'm not sure what "full responsibility" here entails, but OK. A lot of that vaunted "full responsibility" going around. Google's severance packages seem pretty great, so that's something.

What does all this mean for the tech sector in Singapore?

Well, for starters, big tech offices in Singapore are also cutting back on hiring. Fresh graduates dreaming of getting a start in big tech will probably not be realizing those dreams anytime soon. Other than that, this changes very little.

Tech is still booming. Companies both big and small, across all industries, all need tech and those that aren't recently-started outfits are going into a process of digitalization. It's no longer a luxury; the fact that tech is pervasive in many areas of life, has turned it into a necessity. The pay may not be quite the same, and the value-add on the CV isn't all that sexy, but opportunities are there.

Tech is everywhere.

People need to remember that tech is not just big tech; it's everywhere. Finance. Logistics. Healthcare. Entertainment. The possibilities are endless. Tech professionals who let go of this perception that career success only means working in big tech, will get on just fine. As for the rest? They'll sort themselves out, or show themselves out.

Personally...

When I was a young web developer, like many others, I dared to harbor dreams of one day making it into big tech. The closest I ever got was being an agency contractor to one such firm. Looking at the way things are now, perhaps that's for the best. This is not to gloat at the misfortune of those who have been laid off, but to marvel at how well I've been thriving in spite of not "making it". The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, but in all honesty, I can't complain.

Would my life have been far more interesting if I had succeeded in being part of the movers and shakers of the tech industry? Perhaps. I'll never know.

Dreaming about
big tech.

I do know that, notwithstanding the generous severance packages, I'm probably in a better position than those who are in limbo right now. Sure, they have big tech on their resumes and that's always a plus. But how would that benefit them? Like, using it as a bargaining chip into another big tech company which is probably also laying staff off? They could apply at smaller outfits, but even if they were willing to take that hit in both remuneration and status, what company would risk taking on employees who are used to "bigger" things?

So many questions.

The takeaway

It's not the end of the world. Not even close. It's not even the end of the tech industry.

Demand for tech is not going down, but as far as big tech is concerned, the demand was grossly overestimated in the first place. And now that the growth has been found to be not as great as initially projected, the layoffs are taking place to cut costs. Nothing to be alarmed about. Unclench those buttcheeks!

Don't be evilunemployed,
T___T

That Sinking Feeling At Twitter

Looks like it finally happened. Elon Musk is the official owner of Twitter.

From the time I last spoke on this, there has been a series of twists in the saga before cumulating in Musk eventually completing the acquisition roughly three days ago. He trotted into the Twitter headquarters in San Francisco carrying a bathroom sink and Tweeting "Let that sink in."

Oh. My. God.

Being a peddler of corny jokes myself, ignoring the fact that I'm really not a big fan of Elon Musks's obnoxious tech-bro persona, who better qualified to make dad jokes than a father of ten? Just saying.

Not having a Twitter account myself, and therefore having very little skin in the game, I'm largely unconcerned with the acquisition. What actually did catch my attention was this open letter that Twitter employees wrote to Elon Musk to protest his planned layoffs of up to two-thirds of staff.

The Letter

I had several issues with the letter - its tone, content and the fact that large parts of it barely made any sense. Let's start with the letter in its entirety. I originally saw the letter here. 

Staff, Elon Musk, and Board of Directors:

We, the undersigned Twitter workers, believe the public conversation is in jeopardy.

Elon Musk's plan to lay off 75% of Twitter workers will hurt Twitter's ability to serve the public conversation. A threat of this magnitude is reckless, undermines our users' and customers' trust in our platform, and is a transparent act of worker intimidation.

Twitter has significant effects on societies and communities across the globe. As we speak, Twitter is helping to uplift independent journalism in Ukraine and Iran, as well as powering social movements around the world.

A threat to workers at Twitter is a threat to Twitter's future. These threats have an impact on us as workers and demonstrate a fundamental disconnect with the realities of operating Twitter. They threaten our livelihoods, access to essential healthcare, and the ability for visa holders to stay in the country they work in. We cannot do our work in an environment of constant harassment and threats. Without our work, there is no Twitter.

We, the workers at Twitter, will not be intimidated. We recommit to supporting the communities, organizations, and businesses who rely on Twitter. We will not stop serving the public conversation.

We call on Twitter management and Elon Musk to cease these negligent layoff threats. As workers, we deserve concrete commitments so we can continue to preserve the integrity of our platform.

We demand of current and future leadership:

Respect: We demand leadership to respect the platform and the workers who maintain it by committing to preserving the current headcount.

Safety: We demand that leadership does not discriminate against workers on the basis of their race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, or political beliefs. We also demand safety for workers on visas, who will be forced to leave the country they work in if they are laid off.

Protection: We demand Elon Musk explicitly commit to preserve our benefits, those both listed in the merger agreement and not (e.g. remote work). We demand leadership to establish and ensure fair severance policies for all workers before and after any change in ownership.

Dignity: We demand transparent, prompt and thoughtful communication around our working conditions. We demand to be treated with dignity, and to not be treated as mere pawns in a game played by billionaires.

Sincerely,

Twitter workers

So, let's unpack!

Elon Musk's plan to lay off 75% of Twitter workers will hurt Twitter's ability to serve the public conversation. A threat of this magnitude is reckless, undermines our users' and customers' trust in our platform, and is a transparent act of worker intimidation.

Wait, "worker intimidation"? What's with the "intimidation" part? What would Elon Musk be trying to intimidate them into doing? Layoffs after an acquisition aren't at all uncommon, so I really have no idea where this is coming from.

A threat to workers at Twitter is a threat to Twitter's future. These threats have an impact on us as workers and demonstrate a fundamental disconnect with the realities of operating Twitter. They threaten our livelihoods, access to essential healthcare, and the ability for visa holders to stay in the country they work in. We cannot do our work in an environment of constant harassment and threats. Without our work, there is no Twitter.

Seems a little pompous, but OK. Again, I'm not sure what this "harassment" thing is coming from.

We call on Twitter management and Elon Musk to cease these negligent layoff threats. As workers, we deserve concrete commitments so we can continue to preserve the integrity of our platform.

In a professional environment, nobody "deserves" anything. That's childish. It is not about what you deserve or don't deserve, but rather about what you can and can't get.

Respect: We demand leadership to respect the platform and the workers who maintain it by committing to preserving the current headcount.

Layoffs were going to happen, with or without the acquisition. While Elon Musk probably isn't going to really axe two-thirds of staff (at least, not right away, that would be insane), expecting no layoffs at all is utterly unrealistic, and including this demand undermines the credibility of this letter.

Safety: We demand that leadership does not discriminate against workers on the basis of their race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, or political beliefs. We also demand safety for workers on visas, who will be forced to leave the country they work in if they are laid off.

I was under the impression that companies in the USA already can't legally discriminate against workers on the basis of their race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, or political beliefs, in any case. So this seems a little redundant.

It could be argued that these workers, especially if they have been behind the uneven enforcement of moderation policies and turning Twitter into a left-wing echo chamber full of enthusiastically woke virtue-signallers, really have no leg to be standing on with regard to discrimination on the basis of political beliefs. But if I go this route, it could take all night... so I won't bother.

Protection: We demand Elon Musk explicitly commit to preserve our benefits, those both listed in the merger agreement and not (e.g. remote work). We demand leadership to establish and ensure fair severance policies for all workers before and after any change in ownership.

Oh, good luck with that! Elon Musk has a reputation of not being enamored with remote work at all. Anyone making this a demand is practically begging to be part of the layoffs.

And hold on, I thought Elon Musk was supposed to be "preserving the current headcount". Why would severance policies come in, then? This is a headscratcher.

Dignity: We demand transparent, prompt and thoughtful communication around our working conditions. We demand to be treated with dignity, and to not be treated as mere pawns in a game played by billionaires.

Were these people actually under the impression that they weren't pawns? Delusional. You work for Twitter. Not being a pawn of some sort is not an option.

Meet our demands, or else!

I also notice that the word "demand" is used a lot. That is frankly bizarre. When people make demands, unless they don't mind looking utterly ridiculous, they are usually in a position to be doing so. There are several demands in this letter... and no mention of any concrete consequences if these demands are not met. Like, what will these guys do if Musk decides to fire them anyway? Stop working at Twitter? How does this work? How is any of this supposed to work?

Final words

My sympathies go out to those who have lost their jobs, or are in a position to lose theirs. It's rarely fun. And it is absolutely natural to experience anxiety over this. But writing a letter like that really isn't the way to go. If you're going to be unemployed soon, the last thing you want to do is look stupid.

I sink, therefore I am.
T___T

TeochewThunder: Year Eight (Part 2/2)

For this blogging year, the usual features were there - reviews, web tutorials, listicles and so on. I'm glad to report that the popular posts didn't all fall into one category or other. At the very least, it indicates that readers appreciate a variety of blogpost types. Well, except for web tutorials. The readership for those were consistently low.

Viewership for blogposts usually peak at the two-week mark, so they will be judged based on that. The statistics are from LinkedIn and Google.

Top Picks

These are the blogposts that were the cream of the crop. They hit high viewership numbers. Half of them were about current affairs. The rest were made up of a listicle, a review and a dry technical piece.

Crowd-pleasers!

ONE Pass to rule them all was one of my most recent blogposts. I used no profanities in there, but damn, the shade I threw would make an umbrella blush.

The old-fashioned way to skirt the OCBC Phishing Scam was written as a thought piece on something that happened in Singapore last xxx. No surprises there; this was a hot topic on our little island.

Reference Review: The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers; now, this one was a surprise. My reviews generally haven't had all that much success. Add to the fact that I wasn't excessively complimentary towards Uncle Bob...

Ten Lessons From The Art Of War Applied To Software Development, a fun listicle I put together after attending some rooms on the Clubhouse app.

Discrete And Continuous Data Defined is a headscratcher. This was a dry a piece as I've ever done and honestly I'm not at all sure why it got so popular.

Elon Musk and the Twitter Takeover was an expected hit; after all, it was the topic for a while there regardless of whether or not you were a techie.

Excellent Response

This group encompasses blogposts that got a decent amount of readership, though not enough to propel them to the next tier.

Cleared that bar.

Using Trello outside of the professional workplace was a little geek-out piece of how I used this software in my everyday life.

Software Review: Power BI had a decent enough amount of clicks, which was probably better than I hoped for.

Google moves to 2FA! underperformed, really. Maybe it just wasn't that interesting.

Five Software Development Takeaways From the COP Saga in 2021 was a piece about Singapore politics, though I tied it into tech practices.

Film Review: Black Mirror Series One astonished me because I didn't think people would be interested in a series that premiered so long ago.

Trail of the Catfish was something I wrote about an experience I witnessed and was only peripherally involved in. It had a fair bit of traction on Facebook (because people who use Facebook love that shit) but not so much on LinkedIn.

OK-ish

These posts got a bit of attention, but statistically they got the short end of the stick. Most of them were dry technical blogposts, so no surprise there.

Good reads.

Tech Wizardry in the Beijing Winter Olympics and Ten Pieces Of African Wisdom In Software Development were pieces I felt deserved more views, but it is what it is.

Functional Terminology, The Different Categories of Data Analytics, Mean, Median and Mode in Python, Thoughts About HTML5, Different Number Types in Datasets and Code indentation reduction using Guard Clauses were wholly technical, nothing exciting here.

Reading Books In Modern Technology was something whimsical I did. Probably could have written it better.

App Review: Bazooka Boy was a mediocre review about a mediocre app. Probably got the views it deserved.

Special Mentions

These were blogposts that were especially poignant in the year 2022. They might not have obtained all that much traction, but I'm going to mention them here because they were personally important to me.

Spotlight!

How I became a Married Software Developer chronicles the arduous years leading up to my marriage, and is closely tied to my career as a software developer.

Ten Cheap Shots At Internet Explorer is a glorious, glorious day for me and I refuse to let the lack of views dampen it.

That's all for now!

It has been a pretty decent year, considering this is the eighth straight year I'm doing this. It's not been an outstanding year by any means, but I like to think I at least met a certain standard. If you're reading this, kudos for your continued support!

Thanks for your kind 8-tention!
T___T