Category Archives: Uncategorized

Friday Deployment, Brittany Pietsch, and Marketing to “Thirsty People”

As you may know, I dislike the phrase “target audience” and am actively seeking an alternative.

By Christian Gidlöf – Photo taken by Christian Gidlöf, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2065930

So far the best alternative to “target audience” that I’ve found is “hungry people,” which not only focuses on people rather than an abstraction, but also focuses on those who are ready to purchase your product or service.

But I just found an instance in which “thirsty people” may be better than “hungry people.” Specifically, for the Colorado spirits company Friday Deployment, which engages in product marketing in a very…um…targeted way. Including the use of a micro-influencer who is well-known to Friday Deployment’s thirsty people.

Heads up for regular Bredemarket blog readers: the “why” and “how” questions are coming.

Why are Friday Deployment’s “thirsty people” technologists?

Why does Friday Deployment aim its product marketing at technologists?

The website doesn’t elaborate on this, but according to LinkedIn, company owner Rishi Malik is also the VP of Engineering for Varo Bank (an active user of identity verification), and Malik’s history includes two decades of engineering experience. That’s enough to drive anyone to drink, on Fridays or any other day.

From https://fridaydeployment.co/

Presumably because of this background, Friday Deployment’s product marketing is filled with tech references. Here’s a sample from Friday Deployment’s web page (as of Friday, February 2, 2024).

It was inevitable. The tree is out of date, the history is a mess, and you just want to start your weekend. Maybe you just do a quick little git push --force? Maybe someone already did, and you now get to figure out the correct commit history?

From https://fridaydeployment.co/.

But that isn’t the only way that Friday Deployment markets to its “thirsty people.”

How does Friday Deployment’s marketing resonate with its thirsty people?

How else does Friday Deployment address a technologist audience?

Those of you who are familiar with LinkedIn’s tempests in a teapot realize that LinkedIn users don’t spend all of their time talking about green banners or vaping during remote interviews.

We also spend a lot of time talking about Brittany Pietsch.

TL;DR:

  • Pietsch was an account executive with Cloudflare.
  • Well, she was until one day when she and about 40 others were terminated.
  • Pietsch was terminated by two people that she didn’t know and who could not tell her why she was terminated.
  • This story would have disappeared under the rug…except that Pietsch knew that people were losing their jobs, so when she was invited to a meeting she videorecorded the first part of the termination, and shared it on the tubes.
  • The video went viral and launched a ton of discussion both for and against what Pietsch did. I lean toward the “for,” if you’re wondering.
  • And even Cloudflare admitted it screwed up in how the terminations were handled.

Since Friday Deployment’s “thirsty people” were probably familiar with the Brittany Pietsch story, the company worked with her to re-create her termination video…with a twist. (Not literally, since Pietsch drank the gin straight.)

@brittanypeachhh

Not every day is a good day at work. But every day is a good day for gin. Check out fridaydeployment.co.

♬ original sound – Brittany Pietsch
From https://www.tiktok.com/@brittanypeachhh/video/7330646930009410862.

Well, the product marketing ploy worked, since I clicked on the website of a spirits company that was new to me, and now I’m on their mailing list.

But let’s talk alcohol age verification

The Friday Deployment product marketing partnership with Brittany Pietsch worked…mostly. Except that I have one word of advice for company owner Rishi Malik.

With your Varo Bank engineering experience, you of all people should realize that Friday Deployment’s age verification system is hopelessly inadequate. A robust age verification system, or even an age estimation system, or even a question asking you to provide your date of birth would be better.

Bredemarket can’t create a viral video for your tech firm, but…

But enough about Friday Deployment. Let’s talk about YOUR technology firm.

How can your company market to your thirsty (or hungry) people? Bredemarket can’t create funny videos with micro-influencers, but Bredemarket can craft the words that speak to your audience.

To learn more about Bredemarket’s marketing and writing services for technology firms, click on the image below.

Drive content results with Bredemarket Technology Firm Services.

Sugar Pie Honey Bunch

Sorry, but all this discussion about Friday…well, I can’t help myself.

From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfVsfOSbJY0.

And Rebecca Black, who actually has a very fine voice and sounds great when she’s singing non-inane lyrics, has engaged in a number of marketing opportunities herself. See if you can spot her in this ad.

The Pros and Cons of Discriminating Your Product by Quantifying Your Benefits

Some firms make claims and don’t support them, while others support their claims with quantified benefits. But does quantifying help or harm the firms that do it? This pudding post answers this question…and then twists toward the identity/biometrics market at the end.

The “me too” players in the GCP market

Whoops.

In that heading above, I made a huge mistake by introducing an acronym without explaining it. So I’d better correct my error.

GCP stands for Glowing Carbonated Pudding.

I can’t assume that you already knew this acronym, because I just made it up. But I can assure you that the GCP market is a huge market…at least in my brain. All the non-existent kids love the scientifically advanced and maximally cool pudding that glows in the dark and has tiny bubbles in it.

Glowing Carbonated Pudding. Designed by Google Bard. Yeah, Google Bard creates images now.

Now if you had studied this non-existent market like I have, you’ll realize from the outset that most of the players don’t really differentiate their offerings. Here are a few examples of firms with poor product marketing:

  • Jane Spain GCP: “Trust us to provide good GCP.”
  • Betty Brazil GCP: “Trust us to provide really good GCP.”
  • Clara Canada GCP: “Trust us to provide great GCP.”

You can probably figure out what happened here.

  • The CEO at Betty Brazil told the company’s product marketers, “Do what Jane Spain did but do it better.”
  • After that Clara Canada’s CEO commanded, “Do what Betty Brazil did but do it better.” (I’ll let you in on a little secret. Clara Canada’s original slogan refereneced “the best GCP,” but Legal shot that down.)
Designed by Google Bard.

Frankly, these pitches are as powerful as those offered by a 17x certified resume writer.

The quantified GCP

But another company, Wendy Wyoming, decided to differentiate itself, and cited independent research as its differentiator.

Wendy Wyoming Out of This World GCP satisfies you, and we have independent evidence to prove it!

The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology, as part of its Pudding User Made (PUM, not FRTE) Test, confirmed that 80% of all Wendy Wyoming Out of This World GCP mixes result in pudding that both glows and is carbonated. (Mix WW3, submitted November 30, 2023; not omnigarde-003)

Treat your child to science-backed cuisine with Wendy Wyoming Out of This World GCP!Wendy Wyoming is a top tier (excluding Chinese mixes) GCP provider.

But there are other competitors…

The indirect competitor who questions the quantified benefits

There are direct competitors that provide the same product as Wendy Wyoming, Jane Spain, and everyone else.

And then there are indirect competitors who provide non-GCP alternatives that can substitute for GCPs.

For example, Polly Pennsylvania is NOT a GCP provider. It makes what the industry calls a POPS, or a Plain Old Pudding Sustenance. Polly Pennsylvania questions everything about GCP…and uses Wendy Wyoming’s own statistics against it.

Designed by Google Bard.

Fancy technologies have failed us.

If you think that one of these GCP puddings will make your family happy, think again. A leading GCP provider has publicly admitted that 1 out of every 5 children who buy a GCP won’t get a GCP. Either it won’t glow, or it’s not carbonated. Do you want to make your kid cry?

Treat your child to the same pudding that has satisfied many generations. Treat your child to Polly Pennsylvania Perfect POPS.

Pennsylvania Perfect remembers.

So who wins?

It looks like Polly Pennsylvania and Wendy Wyoming have a nasty fight on their hands. One that neck-deep marketers like to call a “war.” Except that nobody dies. (Sadly, that’s not true.)

  • Some people think that Wendy Wyoming wins because 4 out of 5 of their customers receive true GCP.
  • Others think that Polly Pennsylvaia wins because 5 out of 5 of their customers get POPS pudding.

But it’s clear who lost.

All the Jane Spains and Betty Brazils who didn’t bother to create a distinctive message.

Don’t be Jane Spain. Explain why your product is the best and all the other products aren’t.

Copying the competition doesn’t differentiate you. Trust me.

From https://www.yourgreenpal.com/blog/is-there-an-uber-for-lawn-care

The “hungry people” (target audience) for THIS post

Oh, and if you didn’t figure it out already, this post was NOT intended for scientific pudding manufacturers. It was intended for identity/biometric firms who can use some marketing and writing help. Hence the references to NIST and the overused word “trust.”

If you’re hungry to kickstart your identity/biometric firm’s written content, click on the image below to learn about Bredemarket’s services.

Drive content results with Bredemarket Identity Firm Services.

Bredemarket Potential Limited Availability, February 5 Through 9

As an independent contractor who doesn’t HAVE to keep set hours this is technically none of your business, but I’m letting you know anyway. San Bernardino County has messaged me about something…and it potentially affects you.

By Ken Lund from Reno, NV, USA – Cropped from the original, Pershing County Courthouse Jury Box, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3074281

I may have limited availability during the week of February 5-9 due to a jury duty summons.

And because of the confidentiality of jury proceedings, that’s all that I will have to say about THAT.

Currently the Bredemarket Calendly page marks me as completely unavailable during the week of February 5-9. I will adjust this as needed.

P.S. Years ago when I received a jury duty summons that potentially involved biometric evidence, I disclosed that I worked for a company that competed with the jurisdiction’s biometric provider. In this case, the PROSECUTION excused me from service.

Are You ConTENT? Balance Your Critical List With Your Prospects’ Critical Lists

Designed by Imgflip.

Normally I talk about CONtent, but today I’m talking about conTENT. (OK, a little bit about CONtent also.)

There are many prospects that may be CRITICALLY IMPORTANT (the highest of my three levels of importance) to your firm—perhaps too many. You can reduce your firm’s list of critically important prospects without losing them altogether. The extra time you receive benefits your firm and your TRUE critically important prospects. And eventually the other prospects may come around anyway.

Let them

You may pursue a prospect because you perceive they have a need. For example, there are identity/biometric companies that have not blogged in over a year, and these companies obviously have a need to increase their visibility with their own prospects by blogging.

But what if the identity/biometric prospects are not HUNGRY to satisfy that need? (Hungry people = true target audience.) Addressing the need may even be “important” to the prospects—but not CRITICALLY important.

  • Now I can create (and have created) content addressing this need and how to fill it. If a prospect searches for this content, they will find it.
  • I can even proactively initiate direct contact with these prospects, and maybe even contact them a second time.

But in most cases a prospect may respond with a “not interested” message—if the prospect even responds at all.

From https://www.melrobbins.com/.

Mel Robbins has a response to this.

“Let them.”

When you “Let Them” do whatever it is that they want to do, it creates more control and emotional peace for you and a better relationship with the people in your life.

From https://www.melrobbins.com/podcasts/episode-70.

If the prospect is not hungry for your services at this time, let them.

Trying to feed a non-hungry person can have catastrophic consequences. From https://flish.uk/blog/external/2019/09/have-you-seen-the-entire-mr-creosote-sketch-from-monty-pythons-the-meaning-of-life.

And at the same time move the prospect from your “critically important” category down to your “important” category. Focus on the critically important prospects, and be content (conTENT) with them rather than stressing out over the uncontrollable prospects.

But don’t eliminate the merely important prospects entirely, because some day they may become hungry for your services. Continue creating content (CONtent) such as your own blogs, plus social media without messaging the merely important people directly. When they DO get hungry, they will emerge from your trust funnel and contact YOU, asking for your services.

Becoming conTENT

What happens when you, in the words of Mel Robbins, “let them”?

You’re focused, your true critically important prospects are happy that you’re paying attention to them, your merely important prospects are happy that you’re no longer pestering them…

…and everyone is conTENT.

Why Your 17X Certified Resume Writer Pitches Are Failing

Dear 17X Certified Resume Writer,

You may think your marketing tactics and sequence are foolproof. But they’re not. Read on to see why.

And if you’re NOT a 17x certified resume writer, skip to the bottom to see how the resume writing market lacks differentiation. But what about YOUR market?

Why your marketing tactics and sequence don’t work

From observing you and dozens of your 17x certified resume writing competitors that I’ve encountered (and over 14,000 of your competitors that I haven’t encountered), here are the marketing tactics and sequence that ALL of you are using, and why they are COMPLETELY ineffective.

  • Find a LinkedIn profile with a green “Open to Work” banner.
From https://www.linkedin.com/in/jbredehoft/.
  • Send a message to the banner-bearer with canned phrases like “Thank you for connecting with a 17x certified resume writer,” or “May I ask what job you are seeking?” If you are using the same language as every other 17x certified resume writer out there, then the prospect has no reason to purchase YOUR services.
  • Immediately demand that the prospect provide a copy of their resume. Never mind that the prospect’s LinkedIn profile already has the same information as the resume. If you are requesting information that is already available online, then the prospect has no reason to purchase YOUR services.
  • When your qualifications as a 17x certified resume writer are challenged, respond with stupid stuff. For example, say that your services can place your prospect into LinkedIn’s top 10% of candidates for a position. If your “expert knowledge” betrays that you have NO expertise, then the prospect has no reason to purchase YOUR services.
From a LinkedIn InMail from a 17x certified resume writer.
  • When all else fails, talk about the respectability of the third-party website where you advertise your services (usually Fiverr). If you talk about Fiverr (which has over 14,000 resume writers), then the prospect has no reason to purchase YOUR services.
From https://www.fiverr.com/search/gigs?query=resume%20writing
  • Most importantly, ensure that your pitch is the same as the pitch of your 13,999+ competitors. This is critically important—don’t provide ANY reason why your 17x resume writing services are better than those of your 13,999+ competitors. If you provide NO reason why you are better than your competition, all of whom are bombarding LinkedIn “open to work” folks with canned pitches daily, then the prospect has no reason to purchase YOUR services.

So this is why your tactics don’t work.

Why did I rewrite something that I already wrote a few weeks ago?

If you’re a regular reader of the Bredemarket blog—that’s a joke; if you haven’t read my LinkedIn profile, you certainly haven’t read the Bredemarket blog before—then you know that I recently wrote a post entitled “Five Reasons Why 17X Certified Resume Writer Pitches Fail.” It approached your marketing tactics from a different perspective.

But one afternoon when I received three separate LinkedIn InMails from three separate 17x certified resume writers in the space of five minutes, I figured that I needed to address this issue again, in a more pointed fashion. (Yes, I iterate.)

Now I don’t want you to read the entirety of my January 8 post. I know that you are very busy searching for “open to work” people to ask your canned question about their desired position. But I do suggest that you read the fourth of my five reasons why your pitches fail, and take the steps to ensure that you don’t sound exactly the same as your thousands of competitors.

Dionne Quintuplets – School Days, painting by Andrew Loomis, 1938. By Andrew Loomis – https://www.flickr.com/photos/lac-bac/7797309642/in/album-72157631099965608/, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=56000992

Hope this helps.

That’s all I have to say. 17x certified resume writers can stop reading here.

Seriously.

Stop. Get to work.

For those of you who are NOT 17x certified resume writers

OK, time for me to talk to the rest of you. It’s just me, you, and the wildebeest.

Black wildebeest. By derekkeats – Flickr: IMG_4955_facebook, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14620744

Frankly, I doubt that any of the 17x certified resume writers have even made it to this point of the blog post. Like I said, they’re too busy seeking their next prospects.

But the whole 17x certified resume writer market strikes me as one which is sorely lacking in differentiation, competitive analysis, and customer focus. The vast majority of people who provide resume services don’t even attempt to say why their services are superior and the services of their 13,999+ competitors are inferior. And the vast majority focus on themselves rather than the specific needs of their prospects. Why should I choose one of these 17x certified resume writers, and not one of their competitors?

But it’s not enough to take a look at a lack of differentiation in one market. Now I have to take a look at myself. Have I done an adequate job of differentiating Bredemarket’s marketing and writing services from those of my other content marketing competitors? I already know that Canva content creator G from Ray of Social is a much better singer than I am.

From “epic Western” singing to Canva queendom. Sorry, G, but this is still my favo(u)rite song. From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q04LZgFpP9Y

And perhaps you should take a look at yourself. Have you done an adequate job of differentiating YOUR company from the competition? Do your prospects have a reason to choose you?

If you are employed by a technology firm and need your content to stand out from the crowd, let me explain why Bredemarket’s services can drive content results, how I provide services that no one else does, and what we will do together to create that content your company desperately needs.

Drive content results with Bredemarket Technology Firm Services.

Postscript

Just in case these questions come up.

  • I have nothing against Fiverr as a platform, or against similar platforms such as Upwork. I’m sure that there are good people on Fiverr, and I don’t believe that there is a causation between people being on Fiverr and people providing bad services. But I do believe that there is a correlation between Fiverr and bad services, and that if you are on Fiverr, it is incumbent for you to prove that you are qualified to offer your services. (That goes for people like me who AREN’T on Fiverr also.)
  • In addition, I have nothing against Nigeria, or India, or any country where a service provider may reside. While the three separate InMails that I received from three separate 17x certified resume writers within five minutes were ALL from Nigeria (Anita from Abuja, Helen from Lagos State, and Renee from Akwa Ibom State), that doesn’t necessarily mean that Nigerians are bad service providers (or that people in the United States and other “first world” countries are GOOD service providers). But again a service provider’s origin is a risk factor that you may need to consider when selecting someone.
  • Well, unless they’re a rich and respectable person, like a prince, rather than some poor Fiverr user.
From LinkedIn, of course. https://www.linkedin.com/in/hrh-prince-akeem-joffer-b418b5b2/

When Educational Identity Practices Don’t Meet the Future of Privacy Forum Pledge

Designed by Freepik.

When education vendors say that they protect the identities of their customers, but they don’t, bad things can happen. Illuminate Education discovered this the hard way.

On Monday, Thomas O’Malley shared the 2023 Comparitech article “US schools leaked 32 million records in 2,691 data breaches since 2005.” These leaks were due to large-scale breaches such as Illuminate Education and Blackbaud, as well as many other breaches, and affected institutions at all educational levels.

The December 2021 Illuminate Education data breach was first reported in January 2022, and by September was revealed to have affected schools across the country, exposing students’ names, birthdates, and other personal identifiable information (PII).

Two attempted class action lawsuits against Illuminate Education have been defeated. But there has still been fallout:

(The Future of Privacy Forum) initiated a review, seeking to determine whether (Illuminate Education’s) practices were and are consistent with its Pledge commitments, specifically with respect to technological safeguards in place to protect the security of data. Publicly available information appears to confirm that Illuminate Education did not encrypt all student information while at rest and in transit. Such a failure to encrypt would violate several Pledge provisions…

From https://studentprivacypledge.org/news/fpf-drops-illuminate-education-from-student-privacy-pledge/.

As a result of its inability to confirm that Illuminate Education practiced recommended data encryption practices, the Future of Privacy Forum “removed Illuminate Education from the list of Student Privacy Pledge signatories.” As of January 23, 2024, Illuminate Education’s status as a signatory has not been restored.

Can a company’s status as a Future of Privacy Forum signatory guarantee that they take all necessary steps to protect educational identity data? Of course not; perhaps there are unknown data protection failures by a signatory, and conversely a company may implement stellar policies but just never bothered to sign on the dotted line.

But presence or absence on the FPF signatories list can serve as a positive or negative risk indicator.

Two Measures to Generate Content in (Almost) Five Minutes

Adobe Stock, available from https://stock.adobe.com/search?k=5+minutes&asset_id=396765260.

I issued myself a seemingly-impossible challenge eight months ago: to create content within five minutes. Why? Because I was scared.

What scared me?

I was scared by generative AI’s ability to quickly produce content. So I wrote this on LinkedIn:

I haven’t seen a lot of discussion of one aspect of #generativeai:

Its ability to write something in about a minute.

(OK, maybe five minutes if you try a few prompts.)…

What happens to us writers when a five-minute turnaround becomes the norm?

From https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jbredehoft_generativeai-activity-7065836499702861824-X8PO/.

    Never mind that the resulting generative AI content was wordy, crappy, and possibly incorrect. For some people the fact that the content was THERE was good enough. After all, can’t you hire a cheap copywriter to edit the generative AI dreck?

    Now I’ve argued that there are benefits to a slower (i.e. greater than five minutes) content production process that results in more mature content.

    But what if you need the content within five minutes? People aren’t going to wait for my dilly-dallying.

    In fact, my LinkedIn post eight months ago was prompted by an encounter with an impatient content customer. I was waiting for some information before I wrote the content, and someone got tired of my waiting and just asked a generative AI engine to write something. (I think I was supposed to thank them for helping me, but I didn’t.)

    This is not an isolated incident, and even with our lamentations that generative AI content blows monkey chunks, it’s still going to be “good enough” for some people.

    So if I’m going to continue to make my living as a temperamental writer who is a “you can pry my keyboard out of my cold dead hands” type, I need to create my content VERY quickly.

    And sometimes I’m going to have to take extreme measures to get that content out in five minutes.

    Measure one: don’t sleep on the content

    In the past, and in the present when I can, I like to let a draft rest as I “sleep on it.” And I give my customer an answer in the morning.

    From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C11MzbEcHlw.

    I then return to the content with a fresh pair of eyes and modify it (usually by removing huge chunks of text).

    But sometimes you have to take extreme measures, including skipping the sleep on it step.

    From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07Y0cy-nvAg.

    Of course to do this, you need to approach the “draft 0.5” correctly with a focused message.

    How do you jump straight to a polished piece? Meat Loaf and the Beastie Boys aren’t going to tell me. I need to go to the ancient Greeks.

    Measure two: let full-grown ideas spring out of your head

    Non-believers think that Christianity, Islam, and Judaism have some really weird practices. But frankly, they’re mild compared to ancient Greek mythology, which primarily consists of Zeus trying to be the Wilt Chamberlain of his time.

    Take the story of Zeus lusting after Metis and succeeding in his pursuit, until an oracle (unrelated to Larry Ellison) prophesied that Zeus and Metis’ second offspring would overthrow Zeus. To prevent this, Zeus swallowed Metis.

    Makes sense to me.

    Then the story gets REALLY weird.

    After a time, Zeus developed an unbearable headache, which made him scream out of pain so loudly it could be heard throughout the earth. The other gods came to see what the problem was. Hermes realized what needed to be done and directed Hephaestus to take a wedge and split open Zeus’s skull.

    From https://www.greekmythology.com/Myths/The_Myths/Birth_of_Athena/birth_of_athena.html.

    You won’t believe what happened next!

    By User:Bibi Saint-Pol – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2061180

    Yup, Athena, as a full-grown adult (wearing armor, no less), popped out of Zeus’ head.

    Which was awfully convenient, since they didn’t have to go through potty training and learning the Greek language and all of that, because Athena was already mature.

    So if I can conceive of my content as a full-grown piece of work from the outset, it will make it easier (and hopefully faster) to create it.

    Results

    I wasn’t able to write this particular blog post in five minutes, and I still had to go through some back-and-forth to tweak things such as headings. But I executed this content more quickly than normal.

    More work to do to meet the five-minute goal.

    If We Don’t Train Facial Recognition Users, There Will Be No Facial Recognition

    (Part of the biometric product marketing expert series)

    We get all sorts of great tools, but do we know how to use them? And what are the consequences if we don’t know how to use them? Could we lose the use of those tools entirely due to bad publicity from misuse?

    Hida Viloria. By Intersex77 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=98625035

    Do your federal facial recognition users know what they are doing?

    I recently saw a WIRED article that primarily talked about submitting Parabon Nanolabs-generated images to a facial recognition program. But buried in the article was this alarming quote:

    According to a report released in September by the US Government Accountability Office, only 5 percent of the 196 FBI agents who have access to facial recognition technology from outside vendors have completed any training on how to properly use the tools.

    From https://www.wired.com/story/parabon-nanolabs-dna-face-models-police-facial-recognition/

    Now I had some questions after reading that sentence: namely, what does “have access” mean? To answer those questions, I had to find the study itself, GAO-23-105607, Facial Recognition Services: Federal Law Enforcement Agencies Should Take Actions to Implement Training, and Policies for Civil Liberties.

    It turns out that the study is NOT limited to FBI use of facial recognition services, but also addresses six other federal agencies: the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (the guvmint doesn’t believe in the Oxford comma); U.S. Customs and Border Protection; the Drug Enforcement Administration; Homeland Security Investigations; the U.S. Marshals Service; and the U.S. Secret Service.

    In addition, the study confines itself to four facial recognition services: Clearview AI, IntelCenter, Marinus Analytics, and Thorn. It does not address other uses of facial recognition by the agencies, such as the FBI’s use of IDEMIA in its Next Generation Identification system (IDEMIA facial recognition technology is also used by the Department of Defense).

    Two of the GAO’s findings:

    • Initially, none of the seven agencies required users to complete facial recognition training. As of April 2023, two of the agencies (Homeland Security Investigations and the U.S. Marshals Service) required training, two (the FBI and Customs and Border Protection) did not, and the other three had quit using these four facial recognition services.
    • The FBI stated that facial recognition training was recommended as a “best practice,” but not mandatory. And when something isn’t mandatory, you can guess what happened:

    GAO found that few of these staff completed the training, and across the FBI, only 10 staff completed facial recognition training of 196 staff that accessed the service. FBI said they intend to implement a training requirement for all staff, but have not yet done so. 

    From https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-23-105607.

    So if you use my three levels of importance (TLOI) model, facial recognition training is important, but not critically important. Therefore, it wasn’t done.

    The detailed version of the report includes additional information on the FBI’s training requirements…I mean recommendations:

    Although not a requirement, FBI officials said they recommend (as
    a best practice) that some staff complete FBI’s Face Comparison and
    Identification Training when using Clearview AI. The recommended
    training course, which is 24 hours in length, provides staff with information on how to interpret the output of facial recognition services, how to analyze different facial features (such as ears, eyes, and mouths), and how changes to facial features (such as aging) could affect results.

    From https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-23-105607.pdf.

    However, this type of training was not recommended for all FBI users of Clearview AI, and was not recommended for any FBI users of Marinus Analytics or Thorn.

    I should note that the report was issued in September 2023, based upon data gathered earlier in the year, and that for all I know the FBI now mandates such training.

    Or maybe it doesn’t.

    What about your state and local facial recognition users?

    Of course, training for federal facial recognition users is only a small part of the story, since most of the law enforcement activity takes place at the state and local level. State and local users need training so that they can understand:

    • The anatomy of the face, and how it affects comparisons between two facial images.
    • How cameras work, and how this affects comparisons between two facial images.
    • How poor quality images can adversely affect facial recognition.
    • How facial recognition should ONLY be used as an investigative lead.

    If state and local users received this training, none of the false arrests over the last few years would have taken place.

    What are the consequences of no training?

    Could I repeat that again?

    If facial recognition users had been trained, none of the false arrests over the last few years would have taken place.

    • The users would have realized that the poor images were not of sufficient quality to determine a match.
    • The users would have realized that even if they had been of sufficient quality, facial recognition must only be used as an investigative lead, and once other data had been checked, the cases would have fallen apart.

    But the false arrests gave the privacy advocates the ammunition they needed.

    Not to insist upon proper training in the use of facial recognition.

    But to ban the use of facial recognition entirely.

    Like nuclear or biological weapons, facial recognition’s threat to human society and civil liberties far outweighs any potential benefits. Silicon Valley lobbyists are disingenuously calling for regulation of facial recognition so they can continue to profit by rapidly spreading this surveillance dragnet. They’re trying to avoid the real debate: whether technology this dangerous should even exist. Industry-friendly and government-friendly oversight will not fix the dangers inherent in law enforcement’s discriminatory use of facial recognition: we need an all-out ban.

    From https://www.banfacialrecognition.com/

    (And just wait until the anti-facial recognition forces discover that this is not only a plot of evil Silicon Valley, but also a plot of evil non-American foreign interests located in places like Paris and Tokyo.)

    Because the anti-facial recognition forces want us to remove the use of technology and go back to the good old days…of eyewitness misidentification.

    Eyewitness misidentification contributes to an overwhelming majority of wrongful convictions that have been overturned by post-conviction DNA testing.

    Eyewitnesses are often expected to identify perpetrators of crimes based on memory, which is incredibly malleable. Under intense pressure, through suggestive police practices, or over time, an eyewitness is more likely to find it difficult to correctly recall details about what they saw. 

    From https://innocenceproject.org/eyewitness-misidentification/.

    And these people don’t stay in jail for a night or two. Some of them remain in prison for years until the eyewitness misidentification is reversed.

    Archie Williams moments after his exoneration on March 21, 2019. Photo by Innocence Project New Orleans. From https://innocenceproject.org/fingerprint-database-match-establishes-archie-williams-innocence/

    Eyewitnesses, unlike facial recognition algorithms, cannot be tested for accuracy or bias.

    And if we don’t train facial recognition users in the technology, then we’re going to lose it.

    The Double Loop Podcast Discusses Research From the Self-Styled “Inventor of Cross-Fingerprint Recognition”

    (Part of the biometric product marketing expert series)

    Apologies in advance, but if you’re NOT interested in fingerprints, you’ll want to skip over this Bredemarket identity/biometrics post, my THIRD one about fingerprint uniqueness and/or similarity or whatever because the difference between uniqueness and similarity really isn’t important, is it?

    Yes, one more post about the study whose principal author was Gabe Guo, the self-styled “inventor of cross-fingerprint recognition.”

    From https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabeguo/.

    In case you missed it

    In case you missed my previous writings on this topic:

    But don’t miss this

    Well, two other people have weighed in on the paper: Glenn Langenburg and Eric Ray, co-presenters on the Double Loop Podcast. (“Double loop” is a fingerprint thing.)

    From https://doublelooppodcast.com/about-us/.

    So who are Langenburg and Ray? You can read their full biographies here, but both of them are certified latent print examiners. This certification, administered by the International Association for Identification, is designed to ensure that the certified person is knowledgeable about both latent (crime scene) fingerprints and known fingerprints, and how to determine whether or not two prints come from the same person. If someone is going to testify in court about fingerprint comparison, this certification is recognized as a way to designate someone as an expert on the subject, as opposed to a college undergraduate. (As of today, the list of IAI certified latent print examiners as of December 2023 can be found here in PDF form.)

    Podcast episode 264 dives into the Columbia study in detail, including what the study said, what it didn’t say, and what the publicity for the study said that doesn’t match the study.

    Eric and Glenn respond to the recent allegations that a computer science undergraduate at Columbia University, using Artificial Intelligence, has “proven that fingerprints aren’t unique” or at least…that’s how the media is mischaracterizing a new published paper by Guo, et al. The guys dissect the actual publication (“Unveiling intra-person fingerprint similarity via deep contrastive learning” in Science Advances, 2024 by Gabe Guo, et al.). They state very clearly what the paper actually does show, which is a far cry from the headlines and even public dissemination originating from Columbia University and the author. The guys talk about some of the important limitations of the study and how limited the application is to real forensic investigations. They then explore some of the media and social media outlets that have clearly misunderstood this paper and seem to have little understanding of forensic science. Finally, Eric and Glenn look at some quotes and comments from knowledgeable sources who also have recognized the flaws in the paper, the authors’ exaggerations, and lack of understanding of the value of their findings.

    From https://doublelooppodcast.com/2024/01/fingerprints-proven-by-ai-to-not-be-unique-episode-264/.

    Yes, the episode is over an hour long, but if you want to hear a good discussion of the paper that goes beyond the headlines, I strongly recommend that you listen to it.

    TL;DR

    If you’re in a TL;DR frame of mind, I’ll just offer one tidbit: “uniqueness” and “similarity” are not identical. Frankly, they’re not even similar.

    Will Ferrell and Chad Smith, or maybe vice versa. Fair use. From https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/will-ferrell-chad-smith-red-hot-benefit-chili-peppers-6898348/, originally from NBC.

    Intelligently Writing About Biometrics

    Let’s say that your identity/biometric firm has decided that silence ISN’T golden, and that perhaps your firm needs to talk about its products and services.

    Silence is not an optimal communication strategy. By Lorelei7, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3164780

    For example, let’s say that your firm fights crooks who try to fraudulently use synthetic identities, and you want to talk about your solution.

    So you turn to your favorite generative AI tool to write something that will represent your company in front of everyone. What could go wrong?

    Battling synthetic identities requires a multi-pronged approach. Layering advanced technology is key: robust identity verification using government-issued IDs and biometrics to confirm a person’s existence, data enrichment and validation from diverse sources to check for inconsistencies, and machine learning algorithms to identify suspicious patterns and red flags. Collaboration is crucial too, from financial institutions sharing watchlists to governments strengthening regulations and consumers practicing good cyber hygiene. Ultimately, vigilance and a layered defense are the best weapons against these ever-evolving digital phantoms.

    From Google Bard.

    Great. You’re done, and you saved a lot of money by NOT hiring an identity blog writing expert. The text makes a lot of important points, so I’m sure that your prospects will be inspired by it.

    Bot-speak is not an optimal communication strategy either. Generated at craiyon.com.

    Well…

    …until your prospects ask what YOU do and how you are better than every other identity firm out there. If you’re the same as all the other “me too” solutions, then your prospects will just go with the lowest price provider.

    So how do you go about intelligently writing about biometrics?

    No-siree.

    Intelligently writing about biometrics requires that you put all of this information together AND effectively communicate your message…

    …including why your identity/biometrics firm is great and why all the other identity/biometric firms are NOT great.

    If you’re doing this on your own, be sure to ask yourself a lot of questions so that you get started on the right track.

    If you’re asking Bredemarket to help you create your identity/biometric content by intelligently writing about biometrics, I’ll take care of the questions.

    Drive content results with Bredemarket Identity Firm Services.

    Oh, and one more thing: if you noted my use of the word “no siree” earlier in this post, it was taken from the Talking Heads song “The Big Country.” Here’s an independent video of that song, especially recommended for people outside of North America who may not realize that the United States and Canada are…well, big countries.

    From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvua6zPIi7c.

    I’m tired of looking out the window of the airplane
    I’m tired of traveling, I want to be somewhere

    From https://genius.com/Talking-heads-the-big-country-lyrics.