Robots, Cyber Motives and a Trader's Addiction

As another week draws to a close, our editors find time to turn their attention away from the busy newsdesk with a selection of their favourite stories from the press this week.

We start with Avi Mizrahi's recommended reading which examines the robotification of China...

The Robotification of China

This week I recommend you read “Will Robots Ravage the Developing World?” by Christopher Balding, an associate professor of business and economics at the HSBC Business School in Shenzhen.

Most emerging economies in the past have traditionally relied on exports, driven by cheap labor, to produce growth, industrialize and move up the value chain.

In this article Balding reviews how this is all about to change now that robots are gradually taking over low skilled manufacturing, making this important first stage on the ladder to national prosperity no longer viable.

The question that remains to be answered is: will the developing world be able to grasp the opportunity arising from robotics, leapfrogging ahead of post-industrialized service economies, or will the factories come back to the West but without any jobs for humans on site?

Next, Victor Golovtchenko shares a review from the New Yorker which looks at whether an addiction memoire could help us understand Wall Street...

A Trader's Memoir

A trader’s memoir is always interesting to a trader, but a trader’s memoir which addresses the perils of addicting oneself to

making money for the sake of it and addressing the white male domination of a thriving industry is not something one sees every day. Trader Sam Polk, who has turned heads with a New York Times column about the perils of becoming intertwined in the Wall Street machine, has now turned his experiences into a book.

The review from the New Yorker certainly gave me more food for thought about a side of the industry that I haven’t seen - the cutthroat professional traders on Wall Street that have been getting the fat checks that triggered the Occupy Wall Street movement.

The movement has faded, but the traders continue their money-making-at-all-costs quest. The ultimate result is that somehow Donald Trump is reborn as a hero and income inequality in the U.S. has become the highest it has ever been. What is the end-game? I cannot wait to see…

We conclude with Rosemary Barnes' recommended article of the week about Cybersecurity ...

Keyed to be Weaponised

My reading recommendation of the week is "Your Emails Have Been Weaponised. Now What?". In a cybersecurity first, a government has weaponised stolen emails by using them in an effort to alter the outcome of a United States Presidential election.

Jeremy Samide, CEO of Stealthcare, who lectures worldwide on cybersecurity threats and defence, predicted the Russian Democratic National Committee hacks months before they were discovered.

He claimed that the timing of stolen emails released from a foreign government cyber attack against the DNC is no coincidence and that in cybersecurity, there are no coincidences.

He further discussed how cyber motives have aligned with political motives and that with a few strokes on a keyboard, someone with devious intent can ruin someone’s world.

So why should we be concerned about the RNC web security? Says Samide: “It’s your ideologists that are out to make a political message and that’s on their agenda to deface websites, steal information, and then expose that information on the internet."

We conclude another week of stories that our editors are reading. Feel free to share your views in the comment section and any recommendations of your own. We look forward to hearing your opinions!

Check out our previous posts here:

An Attractive Commodity and the Pyschology Behind the Far Right

Banking on Pokemon and a Philosophical Victory

A New Breed of Plutocrats and China’s New Weapon

Gold Standard After Brexit and a matter of National Identity

Genetically Edited Humans And Electronic Persons

Computerised Storytelling And Quantitative Easing Doldrums

Eyeing Up This Year’s Biggest Tech IPO And The Search For Quantum Questions

Financial Efficiencies And Inefficiencies

The Bank Robber And The Psychologist

Fly Me To The Moon….And Bremain In The EU

Brexit: Ice-Cream Magic Or An Artistic Defeat

Virtual Reality and the Dark Side of Shaming

Insider Trading and the Dude Driving Istanbul Mad

On Valley Life and Opening Up AI