I’ve been doing a lot of research on social impact investing and digital identity recently and found the above image this morning. To say I’m still reeling from its implications would be an understatement. This venture capital firm, PTB Ventures (Project Trillion Billion) is one of the funders of the MIT spin-off, Learning Machine, which has begun issuing education credentials on the Blockchain (see the Learning is Earning video) through a partnership with Southern New Hampshire University.
Paul LeBlanc, President of SNHU, is an advisor to the education division of the public-private partnership merchant banking firm Ridge Lane, LLP. My friend Linda, who teaches music in Spokane, shared the insight below, which very much cuts to the chase. I’m grateful she’s allowing me to post it here to share with you. I will be writing more later, so consider this a teaser.
“I hope your DNA, RNA, and basic building blocks of protein, show you have grit and are conscientious. I hope you are measured and ranked and sorted and catalogued by tech companies, and big business, planning to turn individual humans and entire human social networks (called social capital) into a trillion dollar profit market –using the tools of data mining and the big 5 personality identification markers (used by Cambridge Analytica, to sway the election to Trump, but oh well) such that your shelf life is not SHELVED.
I hope the fusion of tech, with the surveillance state doesn’t ever ruin your day. I hope that as technology takes over jobs, and we face the very real possibility of an un-job world, that your value to the corporation, having been reduced to what your online data portals are worth in the new *impact markets*, that REQUIRE ***extensive measurement of humans***, (see Campbell’s law for the corruption that is inevitable) measuring things that can’t even properly be measured, are such that you are considered valuable by the algorithms that define you.
Thanks for keeping track of these developments. The marketing of reputations and other data is well under way. I know of no-one doing so much good work as Wrench in the Gears.
Here are some notes from a recent presentation : Anyone who claims Block chain is “the world’s highest standard for digital document security” is a liar —pants on fire liar. See the absence of an ISO standard or consistent legal definitions of block chain here https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/7/17091766/blockchain-bitcoin-ethereum-cryptocurrency-meaning
IMS is a big promoter of badges internationally. See this example. IMS stands for Instructional Management Systems. BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY, DIGITAL BADGES: https://www.imsglobal.org/sites/default/files/summitDCpres/022818-West-Coalition-Open-Badges.pdf ALSO https://www.imsglobal.org/article/ims-global-mozilla-foundation-and-lrng-announce-next-steps-accelerate-evolution-open-badges
21 states have digital badges in place for teacher professional development, BADGES FOR PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT,MAP: http://www.gettingsmart.com/2017/11/micro-credentials-transforming-professional-learning/
Marketing is heavy-handed BADGE PROMOTERS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: https://www.teachingquality.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Microcredentials_Driving_teacher_learning_leadership.pdf
Carol Dweck’s research on mindsets has been put under the spotlight unfavorably, but she will still issue a badge. See BADGE REQUIREMENTS, GROWTH MINDSET https://bloomboard.com/microcredential/view/1051acb8-7587-48f4-af8f-6ed865e02261
Here is another example of a BADGE, ACTIVE LISTENING REQUIREMENTS: https://bloomboard.com/microcredential/view/97f24917-c7ba-4542-ace3-b9fa88566006
I checked the MIT website, Learning Machine. There is no mention of the number of ways hacks of distributed ledgers can be (have been) made. It turns out that the MIT credentials are subject to many glitches…and lo and behold are relying on email systems to deliver these credentials. See problems MMIT is having delivering its credentials at MIT’s website https://community.blockcerts.org