Resilience Technology Part II: Simple measures to thwart possible collapse

Soon I will post about the passing of my colleague, science fiction author and unique American Jerry Pournelle. And of course much of what I post about today will be altered after we see what is wrought by Hurricanes Irma, José and Katia.  But this series conclusion is already prepared.

And it is about preparedness.

== What holds us back ==

There have been nasty pundits contrasting Houston’s recent experience with that of New Orleans during Katrina, snidely implying that some difference in civic character was responsible -- with possible racist implications. These nasty ingrates, of course, are ignoring the fact that a goodly part of the Cajun Navy – heroically swooping in to rescue Houstonians -- came from NOLA and surroundings, in all races and colors. 

Was the difference one of better preparation? For all their mighty virtues, Texans blatantly do not elect politicians who believe in foresight, preparation, planning, or even sapience. Houston's famous hatred of zoning and building codes blatantly contributed to tens of billions in damage that we'll all be paying for.

But in fact, we now know what may have made the biggest difference between Katrina and Harvey.

It seems that breakdown of the cell phone system was a chief factor that exacerbated every problem during the Katrina Crisis, crippling citizens of New Orleans from organizing themselves or collaborating with first responders. In contrast, partly due to post Katrina efforts by Verizon, AT&T and the others, cell systems in Houston proved more robust, serving people in many districts when they needed it most. And yes, this was also a matter of pure luck. 

Which brings up a pet peeve. For this entire century (so far) – and then some – I’ve said we could double North America’s resilience with one, simple reform…  demanding that phone-makers and cell providers give every unit the capability to pass along text messages peer-to-peer.

One anecdote from the Fukushima Disaster tells of a woman who was trapped and later found dead of dehydration in a basement. On her phone were dozens of outgoing texts. People had been walking and driving by for days, but the cell towers were down. If their phones all had a backup peer-to-peer texting capability, those messages would packet-hop until they reached a cell tower; then they go out to the world.

== Peer-to-peer text-passing. Small step; huge implications ==

The capability is inherent to “packet switching,” the underlying tech of the Internet, and hence we have known how to do this for 50 years. In fact, those clever tech innovators at Qualcomm have already incorporated this basic capability into their chips!  Qualcomm’s Matt Grob told me that P2P modes:

1.) Are now standardized (published in the 3gpp cellular standards.)

2.) They have done extensive tests/trials with partners – “it works great!”

3.) P2P capability has been developed to commercial trial grade.

Matt avows that much further work would be needed for AT&T phones to share texts with Verizon phones. But even if you were limited to one company, this could be a life-saver. Suppose you were a Verizon subscriber in an afflicted area, your send help texts could hop from one Verizon phone to the next until someone reached a working cell tower, at which point all the texts stored on her phone would leap forth across the planet.

Two important considerations:

FIRST - If we were to do this, we would gain unbelievable robustness. Take an extreme case: a hypothetical disaster that took down nearly all cell towers across the continent. Set up a few repeaters across the Great Plains and the Rockies, and Peer-to-Peer text passing (P2PTP) could give us a crude telegraphy system – just via texts hopping from phone to phone all the way from Atlantic to Pacific, uniting the country during any level of emergency. P2P telegrams. The Greatest Generation did pretty well with less.

== Well then, why the heck not? ==

It sounds blatantly simple even obvious. And yet, all calls for implementation of this emergency utility have been met with skepticism or opposition from the likes of AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, T-Mobile, and even some device makers. All know what Qualcomm’s chips are capable of. And not one of them will turn the service on – not for the profit-potential or for the common good.

This article talks about their myopic obstinacy… and hopes that Hurricane Harvey might budge such unimaginative and unpatriotic fools. Though in fact, the report is about a much more timid thing that response agencies have asked for -- simple enhancement of the one-way alert system. We shouldn’t be satisfied with such measly steps; that is nowhere near enough.

In truth, there is no good reason for cell-co executives to fight against backup P2P texting! They could program their phones no to do this, if they detect a cell tower! Moreover, each AT&T and Verizon phone could be programmed to report such text-passings and bill the sender a small surcharge! (Giving small rewards to those who pass messages along.) The only net effect would be to gain a small revenue stream from dark zones that their current towers do not reach!

And yes, before many of you chime in, there are attempts to set up grid or mesh networks using Wi-Fi, or Bluetooth or other ways to get around the problem.  Here’s a walkie talkie app.  

Then there’s the Serval Network…. 

… and Fire Chat. 

Jott’s AirChat feature allows users to send data and texts without a connection to the Internet, using Bluetooth and Wi-Fi radios within 100-feet of each other. 

More recent: with the arrival of Hurricane Harvey, a free app called Zello WalkieTalkie that lets your phone communicate as a two-way radio so long as you have a network or Wi-Fi connection, has shot to the top of Apple’s App Store, making it the go-to service for rescue workers in the Houston area, seeing as many as 7,000 new registrations per minute.

And people have written in to me with many others. (Feel free to offer more, below. under comments.) So sure, the super-skilled and savvy can already go P2P… and that barely begins to enhance our overall robustness. Not when they are limited to one user in ten thousand, and to places with easy-access WiFi.

No, Hurricane Harvey has made it clear. We need to start putting the screws on your favorite people, the cell phone providers. They could turn on this capability tomorrow! (Well, in maybe 6 months.) And they would gain business, not lose it!  That is, if they have technical brains higher than a cryptobiotic tardigrade.

And if the next disaster brings major losses of life and property -- losses that might have been avoided with a simple, robust comm system? Then it is time to bring out the lawyers. I mean it. Some law firm should start preparing this case, in advance, that a life-saving backup service was available the whole time, and that refusal to turn it on was tantamount to negligent manslaughter. They can pounce and then get 40% of billions.

== Coda ==

It looked like sci fi when a Hollywood film portrayed three hurricanes at a time in the Caribbean area.  Now see a picture of reality. 

All across Red America, folks tune into the Weather Channel. They make plans based on advanced satellites and storm models, peering days ahead with breathtaking accuracy.  The meteorologists who do this - having transformed the old, pathetic 4-hour "weather report" of my youth into forecasts that are now useful up to TEN days...  these geniuses are very well paid by a wide variety of eager customers from governments to insurance companies to shippers, agriculture, industry... and they have no need for piddling "climate grants."

And yet, lo and behold, all of them - every last one of them - will tell you human generated climate change is real and a danger to your children. The same gas-dynamics modeling equations that they use to track hurricane paths also feed into longer term models that fit global warming exactly. The same equations. They understand and use them. Fox News screeching shills do not. So, where do you get your science?

Dear Texans and Floridians, you have our prayers and comradeship. The nation stands with you.  You show fantastic resilience and courage. But you elect the worst politicians on the planet. Lying, thieving scoundrels who have betrayed you and our country, and your children in every conceivable way. As the media that you watch and listen to has betrayed you, by urging you to hate every fact-using profession. Their incantations are lies and the shiny "squirrel!" distractions they wave in front of you are beneath contempt.

The Republican party has sabotaged and slashed many of the satellites and instruments we need, in order to understand these things. They forbid state officials from looking at changes or preparing for them. They forbid NASA and other experts from even looking downward at the Earth! They scream slogans to over-rule evidence. They lie : "There's been no warming!" and lie and lie and outright pants-on-fire lie to you... and then they get YOU to repeat such outright, insane, dumbass lies.

Please, when the mud is cleared away and the tax dollars that we send to you are spent and when you get some breathing room, consider taking a community college class in some of this stuff? An online course? (See "Hurricanes: a Science Primer.") Visit the nearest university and wander the halls asking people who actually know something about what's actually going on? Ask your smartass niece or nephew. You'll find that fact-people aren't demons or commies! 

 And if you refuse to do any of these things, can we ask at least that you stop pretending you know stuff, just because Hannity croons it at you? American conservatism use to have intellects like Goldwater and Buckley and 40% of U.S. scientists.  (It's now 3% and plummeting.) 

American conservatism does NOT have to be lobotomized and self-destructively stupid. Your movement has been hijacked by monsters - you've been talked into electing them in great, howling packs. 

We're not asking you to become lefty flakes! Or even moderate liberals. We're asking you to take your movement back from lying shills and then bring a rational, science-friendly American conservatism to the bargaining table. 

We'll negotiate, I promise.

Designed To Let Us Down... our deliberately frail cell phone system

Dr. Andrew J. Viterbi, an expert on communications theory at USC, spoke up recently in support of one of the concepts I have been pushing. Based upon the obscene situation that we saw during the Hurricane Katrina Crisis, when tens of thousands of victims found themselves cut off from the world, even though they had, in their pockets, sophisticated radio communications devices -- cell phones that betrayed folks the very moment they were needed most. Viterbi commented (and apologies for the embedded self-quotation):

Brin goes on to say that the teachable moment provided by Katrina was lost, and that the cellular industry could make a relatively simple, inexpensive change that would allow cell phones to still function to network survivors in a crisis :

".... almost no attention has been paid to improving the reliability and utility of our cell networks, to assist citizen action during times of emergency. To the best of my knowledge. no high level demand has gone out - from FEMA or any other agency -- for industry to address cell-system problems revealed in the devastation of America 's Gulf Coast. A correction that should be both simple/cheap and useful to implement.

"What do we need? We need ways for citizens to self-organize, both in normal life and (especially) during crises, when normal channels may collapse, or else get taken over by the authorities for their own use. All this might require is a slight change -- or set of additions -- in the programming of the sophisticated little radio communications devices that we all carry in our pockets, nowadays.

"How about a simple back-up mode for text messaging? One that could use packet-switching to bypass the cell towers when they are down, and pass messages from phone to phone -- or peer-to-peer -- at least among phones that are of the same type? (GSM, TDMA, CDMA etc.) All of the needed packet-switching algorithms already exist. Moreover, this would allow a drowning city (or other catastrophe zone) to fill with tens of thousands of little spots of light, supplying information to helpers and reassurance to loved ones, anywhere in the world."

These pushes of mine have not gone completely ignored or unnoticed. As Viterbi's riffs on the topic show, there have been some fascinating and insightful exchanges, discussing how the nation and public might benefit by adding peer-to-peer supplemental capabilities to the present cell system.

Some object that this development could cost millions. But that is not any real obstacle in an industry making hundreds of billions in the US alone. If either the government or the cell companies saw a clear benefit model, it would be trivial to justify the relatively small expense. Certainly far smaller than incorporating web browsers and MP3 players!

The problem is that top-down hierachy mentalities do not easily grasp the potential of flattened networks.... and this despite the clear example of the Internet itself, as a super-empowering, hierarchy-flattening phenomenon.

(Indeed, I believe that there are underlying PSYCHOLOGICAL REASONS that the twin examples of the Internet - and citizen competence on 9/11 - may have prompted an immune reaction against citizen empowerment, on the part of some members of the Paid Protector Castes. But that's another story.)

One more-cogent objection to the notion of augmenting cell phones with Peer-to-Peer capability: it takes a lot more energy to transmit than to receive. Most cell phones are actually very weak transmitters that function poorly without energetic base towers nearby.

The answer to this objection is simple. In order to use P2P effectively in a crisis, when the towers are down, personal cell phones do not have to carry voice. In an emergency, text messages can make a tremendous difference, e.g. in calling for help, or informing loved-ones that you are okay, or in passing crucial information to authorities. Especially since text messages can be transmitted with multiple repetition-redundancy, simple calculations show that pocket transmitters (cell phones) could pass these along at trivial power expenditure.

Obviously, this same answer deals with objections that P2P (peer to peer) does not carry voice well. So?The algorithms for passing along text messages are very little different from classic packet switching for email, on the Internet. Implementation ought to be trivial.

How to explain why this simple augmentation has not been implemented, even though it is clearly in the national and public interest? One theory is that the cell companies may feel threatened by P2P capabilities. Or that they see no way to make money off them. But this needn't be a problem. For one thing, it should be easy for each hand set to track passed-on messages and inform the network, for billing purposes. Or else the P2P system can be turned off, whenever there is a fully functional cell tower nearby! Thus, automatically reverting to P2P only under circumstances when the capability is actually needed!

Moreover, there is an added allure to this approach, one that could help the cell-cos make real money. By developing P2P capability, companies may open the door to a new method for solving their "last mile problem" - or how to extend coverage into dark zones, just beyond reach of their current network of towers. Think. Why not let customers who happen to be at the edge of the coverage area get a small pay-back fee for every text message that they pass through, from people who are just outside the covered zone? The same way people with solar or wind generators can make their meters run backward, feeding power into the grid.

If such customers had a more sophisticated home-cradle unit, they might even be able to pass through voice calls from a nearby dark zone. Reducing their own bill, helping the company, and making our entire communications system more robust.

Indeed, can anyone doubt that someday, somebody will realize there is a business plan in this? An entirely peer-to-peer network, in which, customers home-cradle units make up the bulk of an alternative cell system? But we'll save that futuristic sci fi scenario for another time. What I am talking about, here, is something that could be implemented in just one year, if anyone (like FEMA) were actually serious about fostering a more resilient and robust society. A pretty big "if" - apparently.

The fact that cell phones served the national defense so well on 9/11, yet failed in Katrina, should have been enough to tell us that serious work is needed, work that has been entirely lacking while we let ourselves be distracted on other adventures. I mean, isn't it a no-brainer for Homeland Security and FEMA to support this kind of capability, in the national interest?

After thinking about it, how do YOU feel about the sophisticated little tranceiver radio in your pocket, now that you know that it was designed almost perfectly to let you down, someday, at the very moment that you might need it most?

==See more of my articles on Emergency Preparedness

Worldchanging News: Tools for Enhancing 21st Century Citizenship

Now here is a riff on what new technologies could make the most difference?

"What needs to be done in the near future? What worldchanging tool, model or idea will you be watching (or hoping to see emerge)? What key piece of knowledge do we need? What action must we take? What do we do now?"

Tools For Enhancing 21st Century Citizenship

by David Brin (12/06)

Across the 20th Century, a growing array of problems were solved through the application of professional skill. We came to rely increasingly upon professions ranging from medical doctors to law enforcement to teachers to farmers for countless tasks that an average family used to do largely for itself. No other trend so perfectly represents the last century as this one, spanning all boundaries of politics, ideology or geography.

And yet - just as clearly - this trend cannot continue much longer. If only for demographic reasons, the as the rate of professionalization and specialization must start to fall off, exactly as we are about to face a bewildering array of new -- and rapid-onrushing -- problems.

How will we cope?

Elsewhere I speak of the 21st Century as a looming "Age of Amateurs," wherein a highly educated citizenry will be able to adeptly bring to bear countless capabilities and individual pools of knowledge, some of which may not be up to professional standards, but that can find synergy together, perhaps augmenting society's skill set, at a time of need. We saw this very thing happen at the century's dawn, on 9/11. Every important, helpful and successful action that occurred on an awful day was taken by self-mobilized citizens and amateurs. At a moment when professionalism failed at every level. (Hear a podcast on this topic.)

It is important to note what a strong role technology played in fostering citizen action on 9/11. People equipped with video cameras documented the day and provided our best post-mortem footage. People with cell phones organized the evacuation of the twin towers. Similar phones stirred and empowered the heroes who fought back and made the Legend of Flight UA 93.

In sharp contrast, the events of Hurricane Katrina showed the dark side of this transition -- a professional protector caste (crossing party and jurisdiction lines: including republicans and democrats, state, local and federal officials) whose sole ambition appeared to be to staunch any citizen-organized activity, whatsoever. Moreover, the very same technology that empowered New Yorkers and Bostonians betrayed citizens in New Orleans. Thousands who had fully-charged and operational radios in their pockets were unable to use them for communication -- either with each other or the outside world -- thanks to collapse of the cellular phone networks.

This was a travesty. But the aftermath was worse! Because, amid all the finger-pointing and blame-casting that followed Katrina, almost no attention has been paid to improving the reliability and utility of our cell networks, to assist citizen action during times of emergency. To the best of my knowledge. no high level demand has gone out - from FEMA or any other agency - for industry to address problems revealed in the devastation of America's Gulf Coast. A correction that should be both simple/cheap and useful to implement.

What do we need? We must have new ways for citizens to self-organize, both in normal life and (especially) during crises, when normal channels may collapse, or else get taken over by the authorities for their own use. All this might require is a slight change -- or set of additions -- in the programming of the sophisticated little radio communications devices that we all carry in our pockets, nowadays.

How about a simple back-up mode for text messaging? One that could use packet-switching to bypass the cell towers when they are down, and pass messages from phone to phone -- or peer-to-peer -- at least among phones that are of the same type? (GSM, TDMA, CDMA etc.) All of the needed packet-switching algorithms already exist. Moreover, this would allow a drowning city (or other catastrophe zone) to fill with tens of thousands of little spots of light, supplying information to helpers and reassurance to loved ones, anywhere in the world.

Are the cell companies afraid their towers will be bypassed when there's no emergency? What foolishness. This mode could be suppressed when a good tower is in range and become useful automatically when one is not... a notion that also happens to help solve the infamous "last mile connectivity problem." Anyway, there are dozens of ways that p2p calls could be billed. Can we at least talk about it?

The same dismal intransigence foils progress on the internet, where millions of adults use "asynchronous" communications methods, like web sites, blogs and email, but shun "synchronous" zones like chat and avatar worlds, where the interface (filled with sexy cartoon figures) seem designed to ruin any chance of useful discourse. For example, by limiting self-expression to about a sentence at a time and ignoring several dozen ways that human beings actually organize and allocate scarce attention in real life.

When somebody actually pays attention to this "real digital divide" - between the lobotomized/childish synchronous chat/avatar/myspace world and the slow-but-cogent asynchronous web/blog/download world -- we may progress toward useful online communities like rapid "smart mobs." Only first, we are going to have to learn to look at how human beings allocate attention in real life! (For more on this: http://www.holocenechat.com)

Oh, there are dozens of other technologies that will add together, like pieces in a puzzle, synergizing to help empower the magnificent citizen of tomorrow. Facial recognition systems and automatic lookups will turn every pedestrian on any street into someone who you vaguely know... a prospect that cynical pundits will decry, but that was EXACTLY how our ancestors lived, nearly all of them, throughout human history. The thing to be afraid of is asymmetries of power, not universal knowledge. The thing to protect is not your secrecy, but your ability to deter others from doing you harm.

Likewise, I assure you that we are on the verge of getting both LIE DETECTORS and reliable PERSONALITY PROFILING. And yes, if these new machines frighten you, they should! Because they may wind up being clutched and monopolized by elites, and then used against us. I am glad you're frightened. If that happens, we will surely see an era that makes Big Brother look tame.

And yet, the solution to this danger is not to "ban" such technologies! That is exactly what elites want us to do (so they can monopolize the methods in secret out of our skeptical eye). No, that reflex sees only half the story. Come on, open your mind a little farther.

What if those very same -- inevitable -- technologies wind up being used by all of sovereign citizens of an open democracy, say, fiercely applied to politicians and others who now smile and croon and insist that they deserve our trust? In other words, what if we could separate the men and women who have told little lies and admit it (and we forgive them) from those who tell the really dangerous and destructive whoppers? Those who are corrupt and/or blackmailed and/or lying through their teeth?

In that case, won't we have a better chance of making sure that Big Brother doesn't happen... ever?

Oh, it is a brave new world... We will have to be agile. Some things will be lost and others diminished. (We will have to re-define "privacy" much closer to home, or even just within it.)

On the other hand, if we don't panic, we may see the beginnings of the era of the sovereign and empowered citizen. An Age of Amateurs in which no talent is suppressed or wasted, and no problem escapes the attention of a myriad talented eyes.

=====    =====     =====


As many of you know, I have touted the beautiful and fascinating Worldchanging Book as a perfect holiday gift, expressing much of the resonant message of modernist problem solving that we once saw in the old Whole Earth Catalog.

World changing is also one of the prime modernist web sites! Indeed, I'd like to pass on a message from editor Alex Steffen, asking for a little help (in the spirit of "proxy power.") The previous riff I wrote at his request.

" Okay, here's the deal: I need to hit you up for some money. Not much, only $10, but still, your donation is critical for us, and here's why: Yahoo! is offering a $50,000 matching grant for the nonprofit which gets the largest number of donations before the end of the year using its new "charity badges." What matters is not the number of dollars, but the number of donors. Right now, you need 70 to be in the lead, but things are moving fast and we'd like 500 to be safe. We currently have three (though we just started a couple hours ago). If we're winning on Dec 31st, we think one of our major donors may step in and help us with a large donation, so we'll get the full $50K from Yahoo! $100,000 would be a major portion of our annual budget and you can help us win it."

Got it? Do it! Good.