The FT's #fintech newsletter this week highlights the distinct lack of blockchain based systems that have been delivered. Perhaps the hype is finally over. Why is the financial industry so vulnerable to being sold 'magic bullet' solutions? - From the newsletter:- ...... “winter is coming to blockchain initiatives in capital markets,” says Mr Pierron, who expects investments across the industry to drop this year. ...... 2017 already looks like a “make or break” year, says Del

Since the dawn of the digital era, at least, the belief that human activity can be reduced to a series of steps, a computer algorithm, has been around. We can call this philosophical belief Digital Reductionism. To overcome the obvious objections to this belief the concept of Artificial Intelligence (AI) was introduced half a century ago and once again is enjoying much over-hyped publicity. Earlier posts put this hype into perspective. Now we are being told that the employee

! A totally unforeseen side effect of spanitis organising the publication of the book The Programmer's Odyssey has been our involvement in the latest fashion trend! ! Geek-chic! ! Get on trend immediately here!