Hello There:

Thanks to those of you answering last week’s poll. The answers were about equally divided between those who mentioned a blog or co-worker. Thanks again for that insight! 😄

Zoombombing

Zoom has been known for years to be a tool of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Yet it’s amazing that so many people trust having detailed, strategic conversations on the service. In April 2020, the company was sued for sharing user data with Facebook. A few days later, the company admitted it had “mistakenly” routed calls through China.

Then it agreed to pay $85 million to settle claims with the FTC it lied about offering end-to-end encryption. Now, a new issue has arisen in Europe concerning Zoom’s privacy terms and conditions. This March, a clause was added that seemingly allows Zoom to use customer data to train AI models without an opt-out option. This change was first reported by Stack Diary and then discussed on Hacker News, leading to public outrage on social media.

In Oct. 2020, Zoom finally added end-to-end encryption, but it’s buried in the web app portal only and not enabled by default. So navigate to: https://us04web.zoom.us/profile/setting and turn this setting on:

The company adds another hurdle, requiring a text message code before changing the setting. It’s clearly not something Zoom wants to make easy for customers. Then again, there’s no guarantee that Zoom didn’t give the Chinese government backdoor access to all Zoom calls, encrypted or not, so, therefore, I recommend you use Whereby, which is based in Norway and runs under the European Union’s far stricter privacy rules.

That way, you can avoid Xi Jinping zoombombing you.

Bing Is Alive!

Many people winced earlier this year when Microsoft announced that OpenAI’s ChatGPT would be integrated with Bing. Early reports of Bing’s spasmodic “love” episodes and hallucinations did not improve things. Our most recent experience with Bing, however, has shown that Microsoft was smart. The Bing chatbot provides a far superior search experience now, especially since it features GPT-4 and the ability to search the web for more up-to-date information than OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Search results are elegantly summarized and footnoted, as shown below:

We highly recommend you use Bing AI with GPT-4 as your default search engine, particularly when searching for business information.

Ubertrends

Google reports that searches for “trends” were up 47% in the past week. While most of those are probably for “fall trends” or “hair trends,” many are clearly curious about what’s next. To that end, we are making Michael Tchong’s “Ubertrends” book largely available online.

If you’re wondering why in a short span of time, Bebe Rexha, Ava Max, Drake, Miranda Lambert and Cardi B were all involved with audiences behaving badly, wonder no more. Head over to Casual Living, and read about the evaporation of decorum ubertrend.

Since it’s not trivial to move 150,000 words to the web and format and update the content, we will gradually release new chapters, with Time Compression slated to be next.

Gray Rhino

In her 2016 book, “The Gray Rhino,” which was an English-language bestseller in China (are you too wondering why?), Michele Wucker warns about an impending Gray Rhino event. Unlike an out-of-the-blue crisis dubbed a “Black Swan,” a Gray Rhino is preceded by plenty of warnings and evidence that is ignored until it is too late. The reaction by the stock market to Fitch’s downgrading of U.S. debt is another unheeded warning that we’re headed to a Gray Rhino event. A full-scale Russian attack on NATO to protect the Black Sea or China’s invasion of Taiwan will trigger a Gray Rhino stampede, and there will be no money left in the treasury to fund defensive efforts or keep the economy afloat. The stock market is up again today.

Commercial Real Estate

A tangible emerging trend that may lead to a Gray Rhino event is the commercial real estate sector, particularly in Manhattan. Some $1.5 trillion in mortgages will come due in the next two years, a potential time bomb as higher interest rates push down property values. WeWork’s imminent collapse could trigger a significant market downturn.

The commercial real estate market is facing an unprecedented decline. The combination of rising interest rates and a sustained trend of remote work has depressed demand for office space. As of February, New York City’s return-to-office rate was 49%, a figure overshadowed by London and Paris at 65% and 85%, respectively, as reported by JLL.

The fourth quarter of 2022 saw 19% of high-end office space in Manhattan available for lease, a rise from 11.5% in early 2019, according to Savills. Green Street estimates a 15% drop in U.S. property values since March 2022, and researchers at Columbia and New York Universities predict a $49 billion fall in New York City office building values. This decline could severely impact the city’s tax revenue and regional banks, as more than two-thirds of commercial real estate loans are held by small- and medium-sized banks.

Shopping malls, especially older and low-end ones, have lost significant value since 2016. With more than $14 billion in loans due in the next 12 months, per Moody’s Analytics, and rising mortgage rates, refinancing this debt is becoming increasingly difficult and costly. Approximately a fifth of all malls financed through commercial mortgage-backed securities are underwater, warns Kevin Fagan of Moody’s, meaning their value is less than the loans they support.

It may be prudent to consider diversifying risks through highly liquid investments like gold.

😂 

Prompt is on a well-deserved break this week but submitted one parting shot before taking off for Panama.

🤯 You could well be asking, who’s zoomin’ who? The poster child of the work-from-home trend, Zoom has asked all of its 7,400 employees who live within 50 miles of its San Jose, Calif. office to work in person on a part-time basis. Prompt imagined that many anxiously checked Google Maps to see if they lived within 50 miles. Walnut Creek? Thank the holy bejeezus that’s 50.4 miles away! 😂

🥷 Who is the man doing all this zoomin’ around? It’s none other than Zoom CEO Eric Yuan, born in Tai’an, China, and apparently cut from the same cloth as Xi Jinping. As you can see from the pic below, his eyes are set too far apart, a medical condition called hypertelorism, but which in Prompt’s book demonstrates an innate untrustworthiness:

🗡️ Too bad the Chinese don’t practice the ritual of seppuku, that would come in handy right now. Given all their earlier misadventures, isn’t it time for the Biden administration to ask both TikTok and Zoom to vacate the premises? 😏

Stop looking for your WeWork lease and send Prompt a juicy tidbit at: [email protected]m. Your contribution will go to the betterment of humankind and remain strictly confidential.

~ Events Calendar ~

• VOICE & AI Conference (ModevNetwork LLC, Arlington, VA) – Washington Hilton Hotel, Sept. 5-7. All Access Pass: $1,195.

• Efficient Generative AI Summit (Kisaco Research, U.K.) – Santa Clara Marriott, Sept. 11, 2023. Delegate: $1,199.

• The AI Conference (The AI Conference, Chandler, AZ) – William J. Rutter Center, San Francisco, Sept. 26-27, 2023. Two-day pass: $899.

• Generative AI Week (IQPC Ltd., U.K.) – Loews Atlanta Hotel, Oct. 17-18. Bronze Pass: $999.

• AI for Marketers Summit (Global Strategic Management Institute, San Diego, CA) – Virtual event, Nov. 15-16. Earliest Bird: $449.

• The AI Summit New York (Informa, U.K.) – Javits Center, Dec. 6-7. Delegate: $1,399.