Author Archives: bredemarket

Marketing and writing services.

Clifford Stoll Was Wrong AND Right

A former coworker reshared the story of Clifford Stoll investigating an accounting error and discovering a Cold War spy network. But a few years later, Stoll was wrong about the emerging Internet…and also right.

Stoll shared his views in a 1995 Newsweek article that was an amusing read after the fact.

Replacing your daily newspaper?

For example:

“The truth is no online database will replace your daily newspaper…”

Stoll lived long enough to see the decline of printed newspapers in the early 21st century.

Electronic books?

Another one:

“How about electronic publishing? Try reading a book on disc. At best, it’s an unpleasant chore: the myopic glow of a clunky computer replaces the friendly pages of a book. And you can’t tote that laptop to the beach. Yet Nicholas Negroponte, director of the MIT Media Lab, predicts that we’ll soon buy books and newspapers straight over the Internet. Uh, sure.”

Let’s pick this one apart piece by piece.

  • A book on disc? What’s a disc?
  • Yes, to some the myopic glow of an electronic book isn’t the best experience, whether on light or dark mode. But a traditional printed book cannot be read at all when you turn the lights off.
  • Stoll assumed that you would always need a laptop to read an electronic book. He did not envision dedicated electronic reading devices that were smaller than a laptop…to say nothing of “smart” phones with an “app” called “Kindle.”
  • Speaking of Amazon Kindles, you CAN buy books straight over the Internet. And music also, from a company that is no longer called Apple Computer.

So Stoll was not perfect. But he anticipated some things that we still struggle with today.

Unedited data!

“What the Internet hucksters won’t tell you is tht the Internet is one big ocean of unedited data, without any pretense of completeness. Lacking editors, reviewers or critics, the Internet has become a wasteland of unfiltered data. You don’t know what to ignore and what’s worth reading.”

While many companies from Yahoo to Altavista to Google to Wikipedia to OpenAI have tried to solve this problem, it is not fully solved.

And then there’s the biggie.

Isolation!

“What’s missing from this electronic wonderland? Human contact. Discount the fawning techno-burble about virtual communities. Computers and networks isolate us from one another. A network chat line is a limp substitute for meeting friends over coffee. No interactive multimedia display comes close to the excitement of a live concert. And who’d prefer cybersex to the real thing?”

Today’s world is actually worse than the one Stoll envisioned. Not only have I conducted most of my interactions with people over chat boxes and screens. But in 2026 we are now interacting with “HAL 9000” non-person entities…and we may not even know that they aren’t human, but synthetic or deepfake identities.

Despite the benefits of remote interactions—they’ve kept me (and my former coworker) employed—Stoll’s warnings about this new world remain valid.

Wrong but right

So I wouldn’t laugh at Stoll’s derision over the emerging Internet. If you were alive in 1995, be honest: did you anticipate THIS?

You Don’t Need To Give Your Writing Contractor a Detailed Briefing Book

Theory is great, but it’s not reality. And that applies to the relationship to a company, like yours, and its writing contractor, perhaps someone like me.

You already know that you can’t just go to a writing contractor and say “write stuff.” But by the same token you don’t have to create a detailed brief and a detailed style guide. Yes, writers would love that, but if I insisted that clients give me a detailed briefing I wouldn’t have any business.

So Bredemarket helps its clients. I ask YOU the questions. Here’s a quick video about my seven questions.

The seven questions I ask.

I’ve also written a book about the seven questions, which you can download here. (And this book, unlike my book on the six factors of identity verification and authentication, is free.)

So don’t worry about developing a detailed briefing book. We will work together to determine the content you need.

Let’s talk about your needs. I’ll make it as easy as possible.

How Do Privacy Professionals Feel About the SECURE Data Act?

How should businesses, governments, and individuals treat private data? In the United States, the answer varies from state to state, and even from city to city.

A proposed national solution to the hodgepodge of differing state and local privacy regulations is the so-called SECURE Data Act.

Privacy

But how do privacy professionals feel about it?

I knew that CalPrivacy opposed the bill, so I wanted to see how Daniel Solove regarded it.

“Congress’s latest foray is a new bill called the SECURE Data Act, a piece of garbage cooked up by Republicans as a gift to industry in a climate where the public is deeply concerned about privacy, outraged at the harms tech is causing, and yearning for ways to hold Big Tech accountable.

“I can’t stress enough how awful this bill is. On balance, if passed into law, it will do dramatic harm to privacy. It will leave people less protected than if it didn’t exist. I’d call it more of an anti-privacy law than a privacy law.”

Um…I don’t think Solove likes it.

Preemption

One of the huge issues that privacy advocates have is preemption. To ensure uniform privacy across the United States, the proposed SECURE Data Act preempts any state laws that exceed its protections. Therefore the privacy protections in states such as California, Illinois, and Texas could be revoked.

Of course, this is a classic struggle in state-federal relations. The staunchest states’ rights advocate will suddenly switch sides if they agree with a federal regulation, and vice versa. Citing one example, gay marriage began as a states’ rights issue when only a few states supported it, then became a federal rights issue.

Another example is the federal drive to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education. This has not happened yet. And it never will, once the powers that be realize that its elimination will allow blue states to teach whatever they want.

Secure

But let’s go back to the title of the bill, the SECURE Data Act. Upon seeing the title, the average voter would assume that the bill secures our individual privacy rights.

But the privacy advocates believe that the bill actually secures the right of entities to do what they want with our personally identifiable information, with minimal restrictions.

I think the bill’s title may have been written by Eric Arthur Blair.

(Image by Google Gemini. Sorry, Ontario Canada; Gemini may make mistakes.)

Are You Using TI To Its Fullest?

Don’t fall behind.

It should be obvious by now that TI is a transformative paradigm shift that is already affecting the world economy and your own life.

Forward-thinking influencers are reimagining the tire as a sophisticated sensory organ, incorporating real-time structural diagnostics and dynamic adaptation. This is fundamentally redefining our relationship with the road, proving that the future of mobility is being built from the ground up.

But those who remain still will fall behind.

  • Those who purchase expensive TI courses will move ahead.
  • Those who reposition their marketing to always talk about TI will move ahead.
  • Those who right-size their companies to allow maximum investment in TI will move ahead.

Because the tool IS a way of life.

Google Gemini.

Look familiar?

It should.

Don’t fall into the me-too trap. Differentiate.

You’re Doing It Wrong(TM).

https://bredemarket.com/mark/

Stop losing prospects! Use Bredemarket content for tech marketers

May 1? It’s Complicated.

A statement of fact: with one exception, Bredemarket’s work is targeted to American audiences.

Which means the content I am publishing and linking to today is going to strike non-Americans as a little odd.

Why?

It’s complicated.

It’s complicated.

Because even though International Workingmen’s Day was celebrated throughout the world on May 1, 1890, the celebration has mostly died out here, except for its adoption by immigrant groups.

See my tymshft post from 2012 (with corrected link), “The American perspective on May Day – or, I am not a Commie.” I revisited the topic here in the Bredemarket blog 10 years later, on the AMERICAN Labor Day.

So if you want to talk about May Day with Americans, even AFL-CIO members (especially AFL-CIO members), play it safe.

Google Gemini.

Is Fun Allowed?

I have been known to tell coworkers that I was going to “play” with something. Some were horrified, but others understood completely.

Regardless of the emotions you want to convey in the final content, it’s OK to let loose while you develop your ideas.

Luckily for me, a client recently requested some “fun” concepts. Obviously I can’t share the text I provided to the client, but here is a altered representation of one small idea I had.

Google Gemini.

So go ahead and have fun. (Even if you can’t tell anyone that you’re having fun.)

Incidentally, one of the seven questions I ask my clients is about emotions.

I ask, then I act.

If you want to me “act” on behalf of your company and develop product marketing content, proposals, and analysis, then click below and schedule a free meeting with me.

Stop losing prospects! Use Bredemarket content for tech marketers
Stop losing prospects!

What is Your Q3 Content Focus?

Yes, I know it’s still April, and we’re not even halfway through the second quarter.

But the third quarter is coming.

And I already have some idea of Bredemarket’s own content focus in July, August, and September.

  • Something else that I don’t know yet.

I can’t predict the future and don’t know what wild idea I will dream up by July.

But whatever it is, I will commit to it.

Along with the others.

Video 1.
Video 2.
Video 3.
Four pages from "Proving Humanity: The Six Factors of Identity Verification and Authentication" by John E. Bredehoft, Bredemarket. Click on the image to purchase.
Ebook 1.

And if I can help you with your content focus, book a free meeting with me to discuss your needs.

Stop losing prospects! Use Bredemarket content for tech marketers
Book a meeting with Bredemarket.