Doctor From Santa Clara Medical Center Accused of Using Cancer Research Money To Pay His Own bills

If things are not bead enough with the stingy silicon billionaires up in this area with nobody contributing and the hospital facing a huge shortfall of money, now we have this..the hospital is a county facility right in the heart of the big Silicon companies and I never see any mention of anything going here.  Now this doctor takes money donated for cancer research and pockets a bunch of it, even mad his parents house payments the report says.  Now this doctor is not in the poor house and you can read the article that talks about his income and the package of money he just received when he quit, a bit under 100k. 

Santa Clara Valley Medical Center Projecting Close to a $24 Million Dollar Shortfall–Can’t the Billionaires of Silicon Valley Help Their Hospitals Out a Little, Tattoo Parlor Fee Increases Won’t Cover It

The hospital caught on to the scam after the radiology  doctor had resigned.  BD

Here’s the video that tells more.  BD

 

---

SAN JOSE (KPIX 5) — A former doctor at a South Bay hospital is accused of taking money intended for cancer research to pay his own bills.

According to authorities, 45-year-old Dr. Tri Minh Do has been charged with felony misappropriation of public funds. Do recently resigned from Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in San Jose.

Investigators said Do received checks from the American College of Radiology to head a cancer research study. According to the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office, the radiologist pocketed more than $46,000.

According to the hospital, Do earned $293,000 in base pay last year. He also received a $93,000 lump sum when he cashed out his vacation and sick leave.

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/09/04/san-jose-doctor-accused-of-paying-bills-with-cancer-research-money/

IBM To Move Retired Employees to a Private Health Exchange At the End of the Year, Run by A Public Investor Relations Firm

IBM will give the retired employees a lump sum of cash to spend with the exchange.  We certainly have a number of people in the insurance exchange business.  Here’s one example that was in news earlier this year where a former Humana executive started on, only took 3 employees to get it up and running.

One More Insurance Exchange Started by Former Humana Executive–Currently There Are Over 100 Private Exchanges in Place To Compete With State Exchanges

Anyone who is eligible for Medicare fits into the new plan.  I took a quick look at the Towers Watson website who is running the exchange and they do a lot of things with consulting to include alternative capital for insurers, Responding to US Health Care Reform with consulting for employers, Faster and Better Financial Information for Insurers with actuary analytics (similar in math to what quants do) relative to pension funds to help manage hedging operations, controlling healthcare costs with data and analytics, incentive risk assessment, improving employee health and productivity, rethinking retirement financing, using social media to connect with employees, reinsurance needs…and they have the exchange.  I am guessing they have a “loaded” portfolio of all kinds of reports and studies:)

In addition there are bids coming in for the re-insurance division of the company at present and they work with actuary contracts, the equivalent of a quant that creates models for retirement funds.  The company is the largest private Medicare exchange  with thousand of of private Medicare plans from 85 insurance carriers.  They have a new web broker contract with the government with CMS, mainly focusing on the employer side. 

Anyway, interesting to see a heavily consulting insurance firm in the exchange business , but you know there’s money there and with their actuary services maybe some of it gets rolled in to an over all consulting contract.

Some current retirees are concerned as they don’t know what they are going to have to pay and how far the IBM cash provision will go.  BD 

---

International Business Machines Corp. IBM -0.61% plans to move about 110,000 retirees off its company-sponsored health plan and instead give them a payment to buy coverage on a health-insurance exchange, in a sign that even big, well-capitalized employers aren't likely to keep providing the once-common benefits as medical costs continue to rise.

The move, which will affect all IBM retirees once they become eligible for Medicare, will relieve the technology company of the responsibility of managing retirement health-care benefits. IBM said the growing cost of care makes its current plan unsustainable without big premium increases.

IBM told retirees that its current retiree coverage will end for Medicare-eligible retirees after Dec. 31, 2013, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal and confirmed by IBM.

Privately run insurance exchanges are starting to find interest from companies looking to control health-care costs for active employees as well. The approach was adopted last year by Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants Inc. Many insurers and benefits-consulting firms are setting up such exchanges.

Few employees can now count on big companies to provide retirement health care. Only 28% of large companies that offer health benefits to employees offered retiree coverage in 2013, down from 34% in 2006 and 66% in 1988, according to a 2013 survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323893004579059393251153348.html

Samsung Adds RunKeeper and MyFitnessPal to Their Lineup on the Smartwatch–Collaboration Among Data & Data Profile Sellers For More Riches/Profits

Here we go again and like I keep saying, this is an epidemic that is cutting at the roots of our economy at some point.  It’s not only in the Healthcare business but it lurks around the financial industry too as it’s such “easy money” and when their data has errors, well they have a never ending pool of free labor, you, to fix their errors after they have made their millions or billions selling your data.  Recently the Financial Times addressed this as well so now I don’t feel so alone and the article was syndicated on a few other place too like Yahoo. 

How big of a business is this?  Big enough for all to unite and figure some new math models and algorithms to make even more money.  This is not an attack but simply stating some facts and it’s up to you as it always to make your decisions today.  Here’s a post I did a while back where SAP wants to unite with Verizon and pretty much do the same thing, run some additional queries to create more “value” or create more buyers you could say, and split the profits on the extra revenue with Verizon, take a look, it’s all around you.  I wrote this post back in June. 

So Much Money and Profit in the Data Selling, Epidemic, SAP Now Coming in as a Middleman Broker to Interpret Data & Share Profits With Wireless Carriers- Banks/Companies Making Billions

So now we have the hardware folks wanting cut perhaps and adding the software.  I really don’t know what the revenue cuts are here but as the old saying goes, “follow the money”..in today’s world you can’t go wrong with that concept for sure.

It really is too bad that it seems that the apps and devices either can’t stand alone and make a profit or there’s little bit of greed here too.  If you have watched the news of late, you are seeing that the money in cell phone handsets is decreasing rapidly so income has to come from somewhere, the data.  The marketing has been great and the tools are fine for consumers but there’s that back end action that takes place too. 

Back in June RunKeeper integrated with MyFitnessPal, and people were amazed that competitors would do this but when they can make money, anything is possible.  Insurance companies want some of this action too and they contribute funding, here’s Aetna and their “private label” plan called CarePass that has a ton of these folks in there, again they want data.  Insurers are probably both the biggest consumers and sellers in the data world today.  Data as such is queried to create new “behavioral analytics” and whether or not they are marketed properly and have value is still up in the air as you get the combination of combining credible data with non credible with quants usually using some non linear models looking for connections amongst billions pieces of data.  Inequality by segmentation does exist today and here’s a great video from Cathy O’Neill who talks about this in her lectures called “Methods of Math Destruction”…good stuff.  Stay tuned for the Q and A for some bonus information on Larry Summers, she used to do his models at DE Shaw. 

On the topic of addictive behaviors I thought the timing was pretty good with HHS looking yet one more “app cure” for consumers that they probably won’t use along with the fact that HHS folks don’t touch this stuff themselves with this inpatient addiction treatment.  Apps and and the internet “are” the addiction so an app to help with that?  It’s kind of an oxymoron if you ask me and a bit of Algo Duping present here. 

Hospital in Pennsylvania Opens First Inpatient Treatment for Internet Addiction–Was I Correct Back in 2010 When I Stated “Data Addiction Was The Next Upcoming 12 Step Program”

There is value out there and I just try and show both sides of it as the value for making profits is definitely there for the data sellers too.  Moving along a little farther with this we end up seeing articles like this with people “my data is out there on the web and I don’t know how it got there”…well here you go for some of the answers.

Data Floating Around the Web and You Don’t Know How It Got There? Time to License and Excise Tax Data Sellers–Identify “Flawed Data” Epidemic At The Root of the Problem

Sadly it kind of comes back to the fact that in the process of trying regulate any of this that the government is no threat to the process as they are still trying to produce low tech solutions to address high tech problems.  If want to venture beyond healthcare a little, this is exactly what you find with Glass-Steagall too.  It’s a band aid partial solution for an epidemic of data selling.  As a side note when it comes to data knowledge I couldn’t help but address the fact that Congress needs help in this area of education and John McCain is the perfect poster child.

Glass-Steagall Revival Presents a “Low Tech” Partial Solution for an Industry that Needs “High Tech” Regulation-Consumers Get 5 More Years of Bank Modeling For Inequality With Segmentation - No Real Regulation In Sight

In the finance area and when I look at companies like The Lending Club too I have to look at the impact on data selling there too.  Everyone’s doing it and when you look at their privacy policy, well it’s long, lengthy and confusing and why would they not do it when the banks are making billions doing it.

Look at the health insurers buying your Visa and MasterCard records here to see if you are buying a size larger clothes?  Blue Cross said that, not me as their reason for buying the data and experience tells me there’s a lot more analytic going on there more than just to get an idea if you are getting fat.  A data base of such detailed information is not going to be wasted with just one type of query…come on.  I said a while back that banks and insurance companies are just software companies any more with a conversation I had with an incognito banker, he’s on the inside track and knows:) 

Insurance Companies Are Buying Up Consumer Spending Data-Time is Here to License and Tax the Data Sellers-As Insurers Sell Tons of Data, Gets Flawed Data When Data Buyers Uses Out of Context Too

While all of this is going on in the healthcare side about the best we get is “hurry up Health IT” so see what I mean about government and their knowledge being no contest to the math models and algorithms created by private industry and the banks today. 

Theoretically by hiding and downplaying the revenue derived from data selling and with the efficient use of quant to model and create some algorithms that would do such with marketing only one side of it, this is yet one more opportunity to play around with risk with adding this income to the bottom line as far a better income or in the case of healthcare it could be modeled to show that thing are reducing risk..again it all depends on how it is modeled and marketed out there and we see a ton of marketing.  If you want to see how some of this works, scroll on down to the footer and watch the first video as Professor Siefe does a good job explaining how it works and he also wrote a great book called “Proofiness, the Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception”…just the title of that book could be an alert to let you know this exists:)

So with all of this we circle back around to the FTC and what they are not doing about it and that would be add a path to regulate.  If you have read this far then you should understand that you need IT infrastructure to regulate anything today and we don’t have it here nor do we have any transparency here and you can pretty much be assured there are lobbyists protecting this interest, it’s a lot of money that goes to corporate profits, easy money when modeled for profit and marketed in such a way that generates usage.  Addiction can make big profits with that type of consumer action.  It’s been done for years now.

Not everyone sells data though in this arena and the Tri-Coder is one as well as Sensoria who both relied on crowd funding to move forward.  Sensoria has a sensor that work with the accelerators so you get the best of both worlds without your date being sold.  It’s actually kind of cute with their slogan saying “we sell socks, (with sensors) not your data).  I also understand that their patented sensor will work in all types of other fabrics and clothes and there’s work in progress there.  The folks at Tri-Coder are working not to sell data to further strengthen the doctor-patient relationship as well so both get a tool that is helpful and yet doesn’t doesn’t demand you sell your data soul.  I’m sure there’s a few more out there I have not seen yet.  Sensoria received an unsolicited review from Guy Kawasaki about their product so tech folks are paying attention too. 

Scanadu Tricoder Scout–One mHealth Device Not Selling Data For Profit Goes To Crowdfunding, Will the FDA Consider Privacy in Their Mobile Device Approval System

I have had my informal campaign here to excise tax and license the data sellers and I write to the FTC about this too.  With a license, we can identify who the data sellers are as it would require all to identify the kind of data they sell and who they sell to and what consumer wouldn’t want to know this, healthcare or the financial business.  A federal website could be set up and the FTC has had some “casual” conversations incorporating some of this.  Funds raised from excise taxing these folks could be used to supplement funding the FDA and NIH who are all over the news crying for more money and these are “consumer” agencies so keep that in mind.

As the epidemic spreads companies and banks are exploring all kinds of routes and here’s an interesting new one with Humana and Eli Lilly partnering up…and the Humana subsidiary page at least says they are in the data selling business.  Almost gives a new meaning to “drug money”:)

Pharma and Health Insurance Companies Pairing Up, Humana’s Analytics Subsidiary and Lilly To Figure Out How to Save (Make) Money and Provide Better Patient Care–Selling Research Data That Competes With FDA Sentinel Initiative

Anyway stay tuned for even more marketing announcements on how some of these companies will integrate and they may in the process provide you with some addictive data you want and that’s the plan as the consumer sell of this feeds the “quantified self” movement well, which is not all bad but there’s some cross overs to the “over quantified self” in all of it as with anything you have those who take it to the extreme. When you compare the data sellers apps and devices to those that don’t, the privacy statements of those that don’t sell data are pretty simple…a few lines basically saying “we don’t sell your data” versus looking through 1-10 pages of a complex privacy statement.

I try to offer education here as best I can rather than promote “bliss” or create OMG or Soap opera type articles so they are not as exciting as what else you might read out there and some of this stuff is scary too, scare me enough to write about it:)  There’s also this Plos One study, which I wrote about kind of tongue and cheek but the more I see today with Algo Duping, it really does confirm what a lot of mathematicians say, consumers don’t like math and this study one step further and says is gives you real physical pain..so something to it..maybe:)  We know one thing is that Wall Street feels no pain and got over it a long time ago, dollar show it:)

Look at this game called Data Dealer, created by someone in the know to exploit and educate all on what’s going behind closed server doors.  The folks that did this are technologists conveying a message ; like I’m doing here, you can clearly see that in how they created the video.  Well done and to the point.

So this the the call of action for the FTC  and Congress to get out of low tech solutions and maybe get some knowledgeable Quants on board that can enlighten them and the rest of the government entities (besides the NSA as they have themselves already covered:) and get with the program of less bliss, more education and better consumer efforts that will use some high tech solutions here instead of partial band aid low tech solutions that private industry just models the heck out of to find loopholes and keep the data selling game alive.  You get some real action looking for high tech solutions and you won’t have John McCain siting around bored playing poker as often.  

FTC Tries to Bring Strong Case for Consumer Protections With Use of Data–But Nothing About Creating IT Infrastructure Path to Allow Regulation–Gov Can’t or Won’t Model?

Anyway with this current announcement (and no picking on Samsun directly as the cast of characters here with data selling is so large) this is what to expect, more of this and more of your data and data profiles out there and private industry socking more money away with bigger profits…software builds on software and in this case it’s money building on intangible algorithms with more money.  BD

http://mobihealthnews.com/25240/samsung-adds-runkeeper-myfitnesspal-to-smartwatch/

Doctor From New Jersey Identified As The Tip Off in the SAC Insider Trading Investigation-Alzheimer Clinical Trial Information

In reading this article if they have tracked what is said here, this looks like a pretty strong case, especially as the old saying goes, you follow the money.  One of the advisers from SAC is charged with Inside Trading and now the sources of where his information came from is rolling out. 

Doctors, when they get involved with investors seem to have a big way of getting in trouble.  If you go to the doctor’s website, Memory Enhancement Centers,  here’s his brief profile as listed:

“Joel S. Ross, MD, FACP, AGSF, CMD, CPI, is a primary care geriatrician, Principal Investigator, Founder, and Chief Executive Officer at the Memory Enhancement Center of America, Inc. in Eatontown, New Jersey. He is also a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at Mt Sinai School of Medicine, and at the School of Osteopathic Medicine at the University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey in Stratford. He is also President and Founder of the Memory Enhancement Center of New Jersey, Inc. in Toms River and of the Memory Center of New Jersey in Monroe Township. Dr. Ross received his medical degree from the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn. He then completed an internship and residency in Internal Medicine at Nassau County Medical Center in East Meadow, New York, where he was Chief Resident, and a fellowship in the Department of Geriatrics and Adult Development at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, New York. Dr. Ross is a Diplomate of the National Board of Medical Examiners and of the American Board of Internal Medicine with added qualification in Geriatric Medicine.

It sounds like he has years of work related to Alzheimer's research and treatment.  Kind of sad if this is all true as his future may not be so bright.

There’s also a second doctor or researcher Sid Gilman and he’s agreed to work with the government and has a non prosecution agreement and is a neurologist overseeing trials who worked at the University of Michigan.  Gilman passed the information along to the SAC broker that it was going to fail, so what does a hedge fund do?  The sold the stock short, almost all $700 million the fund owned.  This stands to be one the biggest cases of inside trading against an individual filed.  BD 

---

Former SAC Capital Advisors LP manager Mathew Martoma, charged with trading on illicit tips on an Alzheimer’s drug, got some of his information from New Jersey physician Joel Ross, two people familiar with the matter said.

Ross is the physician identified in the revised indictment against Martoma filed Aug. 22 as Doctor-2, who prosecutors said provided confidential information to Martoma about a drug trial in July 2008, said the people with knowledge of the investigation who weren’t authorized to speak because it isn’t public.

Ross, a geriatrician and clinical associate professor of medicine at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, is the founder and chief executive officer of Memory Enhancement Centers in Eatontown, New Jersey, according to his website.

The U.S. alleged Martoma used the information from the two doctors, who were involved in the trial of bapineuzumab, or “bapi,” to help the hedge fund make $276 million by trading in shares of Elan Corp. (ELN:US) and Wyeth LLC. The government has called it the biggest criminal insider-trading case against an individual in history.

In the SAC indictment, prosecutors claimed that two unidentified SAC health-care analysts exchanged e-mails with Cohen on April 11, 2008, and the next day about information they’d gotten through a paid consultation with an unidentified clinical investigator on the trial of the Alzheimer’s drug.

In mid-July 2008, Gilman passed Martoma secret data showing that bapi failed to halt progression of Alzheimer’s in patients in the clinical test, the U.S. said.

When Martoma learned that Wyeth and Elan would report negative data on the drug, Martoma had a 20-minute phone call with Cohen, according to the government. The hedge fund owner, at Martoma’s recommendation, sold almost all of the fund’s $700 million position in Elan and Wyeth, then sold the stock short, prosecutors said.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-09-05/sac-insider-case-second-tipper-said-to-be-new-jersey-doctor-1

Doctor Sings the Obamacare Blues, Talking About “The Elephant in the Exam Room”…Video

This is actually pretty good and yes there’s a couple flashes of ads in here for his book called Elephants in the Exam Room , we all know doctors are looking for extra income today since their compensation is being cut right and left and some even get paid less than Medicare by some insurers…cute song!

I like the “jump start” of the doctors at the beginning of the video.  The book is said to focus on all the standards doctors have to meet today and how they get kicked around and it’s those analytical algorithms (aka the Attack of the Killer Algorithms)  doing the segmentation for payer approval and compensation.  If you don’t know what inequality is with segmentation watch this video as insurers are “supposed” to be doing in reverse but they don’t. 

I think probably a possible message here with Obamacare to ask is “what in the world have these insurance companies evolved to be” that we are going to required to pay for our healthcare, you think? Are they just software companies like the banks?  Maybe this is what is upsetting us more than Obamacare you think? 

Banks Are Actually Just Software Companies and the Same Can Pretty Much Be Said for Health Insurance Companies As Well-5 Unspoken Reasons Tech Projects Fail

How many subsidiary companies do insurers own and what do they do, breathtaking?  You can almost pretty much safely say the insurance business is not the way it was a few years ago and granted technology affects every business but when will segmentation obtain some balance and accountability of the math models and formulas used in healthcare as insurance companies have hundred of Quants they hire to build them and accountability is rarely questioned.

Sadly the government has been no match for the math and formulas being used as first of all they don’t even publicly admit it exists, scary and we keep getting pushed on the app delusion that they can cure all, just shove more apps out there to consumers as a fix, Algo Duping at HHS is somewhat accelerated.    Just look at want ads anywhere for insurers…jobs for tons of analytic folks working off of who knows what kind of math models, they are hidden in code:) 

If you get confused by all the reports and marketing and other things you see out there today, visit the Algo Duping page or scroll to the footer of this page for a few of the same videos for a look from a different perspective and and become a skeptic if you think something is not right, never hurts to ask for sure. 

It is fact today that we lack the number of people required that know how to efficiently deal with the “flawed data” that is on the rise, basically due to the data selling epidemic we have in the US, where everyone wants their algorithms to make easy money for them.  It’s been exploited too with a game called “Data Dealers” and this too impacts a lot of the analytics you see out there today, so become a skeptic when you need to be. 

The video is done well with some parodies (buy medical records from a disgruntled nurse and sell them, set up websites, hack the other data brokers on so on). BD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S86P5ejdsqU

New Non Surgical Procedure “Zeutering” Sterilizes Male Dogs–Is This a Michelson Prize Contestant Or At Least an Honorable Mention From Dr. Gary Michelson?

I have written about Gary Michelson here a few times and he’s a bit of a hero as well as a wealthy man these days for taking on Medtronic years ago for violating his patents, and he won big.  When I read this article I immediately thought of his prize contest for non surgical sterilization of animals.

Dr. Gary K. Michelson With Philanthropy, Pets and One Who Won over Big Business

Here’s my original post from 2008 which at the time I found it entertaining as it came the day after the Wellpoint/Blue Cross X-Prize  farce wanting to hand out $10 Million to solve healthcare and it doesn’t take a brain surgeon today to see how much of a farce it was, but I did back then and thought the $25 million prize as Dr. Michelson offered was great and he said himself $10 million was not enough to get people interested but $25 million, they get interested:)  Here’s a link to the full criteria for the prize. 

$75 Million Prize for a way to sterilize pets – a one-time non-surgical means to sterilize male and female cats and dogs

Now this story says they only do male dogs so far so that leaves female dogs and both sexes of cats still needing a solution.  If these folks are not a full on winner they deserve something at least for their progress in this fields.  It mentions that the dogs may still show aggressive behavior and such though and I had dogs that have been neutered too where that doesn’t go away, both male and female so there’s no perfect answer on that one and it works the same way for humans come to think of it:)

The video below gives more details on how this works, good stuff and as the article states, the male dogs can cosmetically still look like they have balls so we have that side addressed with our pets now:)  BD

---

A new non-surgical procedure to sterilize male dogs is gaining attention in the Inland Empire, but some say it may not offer the same benefits as surgical neutering.

CBS Los Angeles reports that the Humane Society of San Bernardino is the first place to offer the procedure called "Zeutering." It provides chemical sterilization to male dogs by injecting the chemical Zeuterin into their reproductive organs.

"The reason that we started using it here at the Humane Society and offering it to clients is for those clients who like the cosmetic appearance of an intact male dog," said Dr. Amy Raines.

The procedure is non-invasive, according to Dr. Raines, and dogs are lightly sedated but do not require general anesthesia. The procedure costs about the same as surgical neutering.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57601362/new-non-surgical-procedure-zeutering-offers-alternative-to-neutering-for-dogs/

Senator John McCain: Another Demonstration of Why Congress Should Reinstitute the Office of Technology Assessment, When Education Takes Place, Less Distractions With Boredom And More Respect for Consumers…

Yes it has been all over the news and yesterday when I saw the tweet, I tweeted and thought his Twitter account had been hacked..nope…it was him, bragging on how he got busted.  What a discourtesy to all of us and we keep seeing it but maybe not quite as outrageous as this, the response “bragging” is what the real impact was, like a kid who got busted, so what do we have in DC, a bunch of kids at heart?  Is this as good as it gets? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Office of Technology Assessment is non partisan tool that Gingrich and his bunch got rid of a number of years ago and now with complexities at an all time high and education being the focus, it boggles my mind why we have role models like this, you think?  This is why you can’t expect  more than “low tech partial band aid solutions” for high tech problems that need to be solved.  The folks are out of touch.  A good example of this is the Glass Steagall bill to bring it back and certainly it’s better than nothing but it’s low tech problem solving that is inadequate for high tech problems. These folks on the Hill are no competition for the thousands of Quants and Business Analytics experts out there modeling for profit, it shows big time.

Glass-Steagall Revival Presents a “Low Tech” Partial Solution for an Industry that Needs “High Tech” Regulation-Consumers Get 5 More Years of Bank Modeling For Inequality With Segmentation - No Real Regulation In Sight

Part of the issue too lies with what I call “non participation” and I have been using the term “non participants” for a number of years and it goes hand in hand with the old paradigm of “its for those guys over there”,  I read it loud and clear in the news all the time.  Might the fact that 84% of the Senators still use all paper methodologies for all their work when the Senate makes digital systems available?  I assume McCain is a “paper senator” from what I read.  This gets really interesting though when “Paper Senators” discuss doctors transitioning to electronic medical records…oh the gap shows big time:)  The Daily Show report on this….

We hear the conversation all the time about “paper doctors” who have not moved on to electronic medical records and now we have “paper senators” discussing “paper doctors” and how to improve things, sounds like big oxymoron to me:)

The Office of Technology restoration is a project of the Sunlight Foundation and boy have I written about it, tweeted it and more, because it’s needed and Congress could certainly entertain sharing it too with executive heads out there as it would be a huge tool to help educate those in DC.  Here’s where I first wrote about it back in February of this year.  Why overlook and discount such a valuable tool I ask? 

Congress Needs a Bigger Brain–Restore the Office of Technology Assessment And Truly Assess What is Useful And Remove The Algo Duping Permeating In Government–Fantasy Perceptions That Are Not Real Can Be A Dangerous Thing

I would like to see a government that doesn’t get Algo Duped as often as it affects all of us and the result is the Attack of the Killer Algorithms as I call it with every day examples of how it hurts consumers.  There is a reason for a lot this though as this PLOS One study pointed out and yes I published my opinion with a little satire in there just due to the nature of the study with math causing real physical pain to humans..full on study with MRI images and all.  I think there’s a lot of pain in Washington, do you?  I feel their pain everyday in how it affects me as a consumer:) 

“Algo Duping” – PLOS One Journal Publication Explains Why The Fear of Math Plays a Big Role As One Underlying Reason We All Get Duped And Those Who Don’t Fear Math Take All the Money, Gradually, Using “Mathematical Formulas & Algorithms”

This professor agrees with me about Algo Duping….a tweet…

If we could get some folks educated in DC maybe they would have a better understanding of how more sophisticated Algo Duping takes place..another PLOS One on the manipulation of “P” values with research…how many Senators know what a “P” value is..this explains a bit at the link below..do they need to know about what it is, sure they do as they make laws regarding such topics.

PLOS One Abstract–Methodology for Detecting Manipulation of “P Values” To Show Significant Statistical Value, “Inappropriate Fiddling” Which Can Lead to “Algo Duping” Situations And Numbers

This entire scenario is really sad as it was like school child that got caught..I would like to think that mentalities are higher in DC, but stuff like this kind of sets me back with my perceptions.  Let’s embed one of the best education videos I have on the Algo Duping page and take a look at this will explain how it works and how all get duped…the old saying of “throw numbers at them” still prevails, whether the numbers are correct or skewed either on purpose or by accident.  The topic of the video is it’s all about context and the context in DC is pretty scary as the duping continues in way too many areas. 

I always say education is the best cure and what’ wrong with more of that taking place with lawmakers?  We might see more interests in many topics discussed on the floors of the House and Senate if they were armed with more education instead of having to guess or get bored as again most lawmakers are no competition for all the Quants, analysts and other mathematical model builders employed by the banks and corporate structures..boy does it show, again just read the title of this blog post:) 

A long time ago and there are several posts on this blog about the idea of Congress using IBM Watson to search and get the information they need.  They didn’t see it as a tool to help them either, but Citibank did and is making more money than ever-see any correlation here with how data is used?  This post was from 2012 and there several more before that one on the same topic.  Watson would allow for speech recognition to let the paper senators and representatives to also participate and get them up to snuff even though they are still stuck on paper.  This post was Chapter 22 of my Attack of the Killer Algorithm series.

IBM Watson Going to Work At Citigroup on Wall Street–Congress Didn’t See Big Data As A Tool (Hadoop Framework) When They Had Their Chance…For Consumers The Attack of the Killer Algorithms–Chapter 22

IBM Watson Capabilities Being Pitched to Financial Industry-Congress Must Not Have Felt They Needed This So Further Behind We Fall With Effective Intelligent Lawmaking

In the footer of this blog I feature some basic education videos that explain the IT infrastructures used today and when you read the news, hardly any journalists discuss this intelligently from the education side, we just get the OMG, witch hunts, drama queens/kings, and soap opera versions, which I get as journalists today are graded on the read they get and this sucks people in so they need their jobs to meet those “hit” goals on their stories for a lot of it. 

So in summary I guess this is as good as it gets, right?  In my own heart of trying to help consumers with education material I look at what I saw yesterday as a real set back and basically exposed some attitudes and paradigms that get hidden from us most of the time.

Would it be nice if Senator McCain after this would drive an effort for better education in DC?  Again he was not even embarrassed and bragged about it…big disappointment to me as that’s not what I expect from the people we elect and appoint to represent us…kind of a slap in the face and the reality of what’s there it appears.  So we can count on a future of continued “low tech solutions for high tech problems” I guess.

Sad it has to be this way but the role models we have not been very effective, and that is non partisan.  Math models that “behave badly” (his book)to quote Emanuel Derman (former Goldman Sachs quant, now a university professor) and the “Weapons of Math Destruction” (Cathy O’Neil former quant for Larry Summers” will continue to prevail. 

It’s a fixable problem, education but nobody seems to be interested.  (Videos in the footer)  BD

Treating Prostate Cancer in the Future Could Become A Lot More Affordable And Less Toxic–Allspice in Lab Testing Shown to Substantially Slow Tumor Growth Of Cancer Cells

One thing nice is Allspice is non toxic and if you read the article in full the researchers were kind of astonished themselves to see it work and target the androgen receptor.  The University of Miami hopes not too far down the road to start clinical trials for men being treated for prostate cancer.  They are not far enough along yet but in one statement in the article is says they are also curious if this could help even “prevent” some cancer development.

This is kind of amazing with the finding as look at the millions and billions spent on developing prostate cancer drugs and this in no way is saying it would be a full on replacement, too early to tell.  I can find some Allspice in kitchen with my other spices.  Again the lack of toxicity here is a real plus for sure.  The clinical trials they hope to begin would be for men who have not reached the point of needing treatment yet, so a safe place to start with just using it as a daily supplement. 

Now for a little more good news, they have also shown that the extract also slows the speed of breast cancer too, a double win for both sexes but researchers are not as far along and there’s a different polyphenol.  BD

---

“Androgen receptor, or AR for short, is the principal drug target for the treatment of prostate cancer, but there is no drug that completely eliminates AR. This complex compound in allspice seems to do that,” Lokeshwar said. “The most interesting data shows that it actually kills tumor cells which express the very specific prostate cancer marker, the androgen receptor. That is not to say that people should start eating allspice with every meal, but there exists the potential that the slow and steady consumption of this chemo-dietary agent may slow or even prevent prostate cancer.”

Essential to jerk seasoning, allspice is known for flavoring Jamaican and other cuisines around the world with a blend of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and pepper but, according to a new study by Miller School researchers, the aromatic spice could be known one day for impeding the growth of, or maybe even preventing, prostate cancer, the No. 2 cancer-killer of men in the U.S.

In the study published online May 8 in the Oxford Journals’ Carcinogenesis and led by Bal L. Lokeshwar, Ph.D., professor of urology and radiation oncology and Co-Director of Research in the Department of Urology, researchers demonstrated that Ericifolin, a complex compound in the allspice berry, significantly slows the growth of prostate cancer tumors by suppressing the androgen receptor (AR). A molecule central to the growth and metastasis of prostate cancer, AR enables prostate cancer cells to survive even after hormone therapy, which along with surgery and radiation is the standard treatment for prostate cancer.

They also hope to begin a clinical trial in the near future with UHealth patients who are under active surveillance for early-stage or slow-growing prostate cancer, which does not yet warrant treatment. Since allspice is not toxic, Lokeshwar reasons those patients would be ideal candidates to take Ericifolin as a daily dietary supplement.

They are not sure yet which one but, in Lokeshwar’s mind, that discovery raises the possibility that allspice may have many anticancer properties worth exploring.

http://med.miami.edu/news/miller-school-researchers-discover-prostate-cancer-fighting-compound-in-all/

Microsoft Buys the Nokia Device Business for Over $7 Billion-My New Nokia WindowsPhone Lumina 928 Is Now Official Microsoft Hardware, Best Cellphone I Have Ever Owned

I just got my new phone less than a week ago and I do have to say this the best cellphone I have ever owned.  I’m with Verizon and the upgrade from my old Windows Phone didn’t cost a cent for the phone. So where can you not get a deal like this one.  I was going to do a blog post this week and talk a little bit about it but its seems a few words right now would be appropriate in post.

A full press conference is to be held Tuesday September 3rd EEST so if you are here in the US you will have to get up real early, especially California, or just stay up. 

“Nokia will host a press conference today, Tuesday, Sept. 3, at 11 a.m. EEST in Dipoli, Espoo (Otakaari 24). Registration will start at 10 a.m., and the doors will open at 10.40 a.m. Due to space constraints, only media who show valid press credentials at the registration will be admitted. Media are encouraged to watch a live webcast of the press conference at: http://press.nokia.com/”

This continues to affirm the Microsoft commitment to the hardware business for sure.  The Windows Phone has been a bit of a sleeper but I have stayed with them as I like security and it’s the best out there in that department.  32,000 employees from Nokia will become Microsoft employees world wide.  I guess with all the press about Ballmer retiring, he’s not doing too bad.  All companies go through cycles and I just read the other day in Germany that Windows Phones surpassed the number of IPhones, not here in the US yet by a long shot. 

I also read some reviews to where some people commented on switching from their IPhones.  If you like pictures the Nokia 928 has about the best camera on a phone out there and it works well.  I like too how the Windows software as integrated the camera with “tiles” to connect to other apps that use the camera, like the scanner.  I have used it a couple times, lines and works well.

Stephen Elop is stepping aside as Nokia CEO to become executive VP of devices and services. Nokia Chairman Risto Siilasmaa will serve as interim CEO

“As part of the transaction, Nokia is assigning to Microsoft its long-term patent licensing agreement with Qualcomm, as well as other licensing agreements.

Microsoft is also acquiring Nokia’s Mobile Phones business unit, which serves hundreds of millions of customers worldwide, and had sales of 53.7 million units in the second quarter of 2013. Microsoft will acquire the Asha brand and will license the Nokia brand for use with current Nokia mobile phone products. Nokia will continue to own and manage the Nokia brand. This element provides Microsoft with the opportunity to extend its service offerings to a far wider group around the world while allowing Nokia’s mobile phones to serve as an on-ramp to Windows Phone.”

Finland has been selected as the new data center for Europe and there’ more than a quarter of a billion dollars to be spent there. 

I go way back with Microsoft Mobile products to being one of the original Windows Mobile User Group members in Los Angles and we are the oldest group out there for over 15 years and we still meet. When I think back to the early days and scratching out a few of the old antique VB apps that the early phones had, boy have we come a long way.  A couple years ago Microsoft actually came out and did some pictures on the group. 

The Lumina 928 phone is bigger too and I like that as the older I get, the bigger screen I like and I’m sure a few share that sentiment with me no matter what phone you use.

The battery life is great and it’s now in the 4G area for Verizon coverage so speed is great with the data.  Of course on thing the WindowsPhone has that the others don’t is “Mobile X-Box” and I have never used a regular X-Box but being it is on the phone I have tried my hand at a few games when I have a few idle minutes.

On item I complain about once in a while is “app overload” and the phone didn’t come overloaded with useless apps so I appreciate that quite a bit.  I can access Drop Box, Sky Drive (and that mobile interface is pretty neat).  The Home Page program tiles are simple and easy to use and I like new “smaller’ tiles you can mix in with the big ones.

Email works great and again the fastest most responsive cellphone I have owned.  The only thing I have not tried yet is Skype (also owned by Microsoft) and that’s next on my list.  Nokia and Microsoft have built a good product hardware wise and software wise for the operating system. 

If you want a super 4G phone, the Nokia Lumina 928 is it!  BD 

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2013/Sep13/09-02AnnouncementPR.aspx

“The Tax Free Tour” Documentary on How the Tax Havens Work, Who Runs and Owns Them, How Accountants Are Taking Over the Regulators And Not Held Accountable…

If you liked the video about the Quants, which is always located in the footer of this blog, this is another film they made and it does good a job of explaining how the big corporations get their tax havens.  Right out of the barrel they begin with Apple and interesting how they explain and the Netherlands has like no tax on intellectual property so the chain there is interesting on how it leads back to a US LLC.  See how the names don’t always identify who they are as well.  Wal-Mart is also covered in depth. 

According to this video, there are always 4 companies present, (screenshot at the right) with most tax havens, all names you probably recognize too.  Familiar advisers are why they are used and the constant feature.  Without one or all of the firms you really will not have a good tax haven.  Banks in there too, all of them.  Banks, lawyers and accountants are the 3 needed elements.  What is “neutral” taxation?  It means “no tax”.  Tax optimization is another term that means “no tax”.

The video shows the internal, secret world of where the billionaires live and travel.  They make themselves invisible from money, nothing has their name on it and they deal with “cash”…amazing as they try to push consumers away from cash.  The same laws and regulations don’t seem to apply to many of the billionaires. 

The process of "globalization" was organized by the banksters at the helm of multinational companies with a single purpose in mind, make money. Certainly 35% which is the rate for the US is large percentage but somewhere between 35% and zero would be a help. 

Intellectual property profits go to a Dutch “mail box” company for one example, where patents are held…so guess where the royalties go?  You got it, the mailbox.  Starbucks is identified as a mailbox company and the “trademark fees” flow back to the Netherlands so they are another one that hardly pays any tax.  The one man interviewed here said it’s hard to compete with “zero”, in other words no tax.

The Parliament meeting in the UK with asking Starbucks about their 15 year running streak of no profits is rich “why are you still operating here”…you show you are losing money here and we need a better explanation.  They hammer on Amazon pretty well too.  The woman leading it gets right to the point in her speech and then apologizes. 

It’s called working within the gaps of the law, why we digital centric types of laws soon that spell out the IT infrastructure and transaction paths.  Accountants have had a pretty good ride and nobody has really questioned them.  Why are the accountants no held accountable when banks failed?  Nobody judges them and in the UK they are taking over the regulators, so we are back the same 4 pictured above. 

What kind of models do these tax havens have, I guess we go back to the big 4 accountants for answers, right?  Markets get distorted with all this as well with share prices.  It’s the same old story with the middle class and the poor paying taxes.  BD 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4o13isDdfY&list=PL9ABD0BB3C3BEDE19

Mayo Blooming Prairie Clinic Closes As Only Person Licensed to See Patients Resigned, Replacement Needed

The closure was real quick, as most said they heard it on Tuesday and on Wednesday the clinic was closed.  The only person at the clinic who could see patients, a nurse practitioner left.  So the clinic is looking for a replacement and the reason for the closure is “staff shortage”.  Her page is still up here but I would guess it won’t be for long. 

Some doctors are not taking new patients so this is a bit of a hardship here as well as patients driving to other Mayo facilities until a replacement is found.  Patients would have to travel to Austin or Rochester.   According to this article it states even if they do get a doctor it may only be open a couple days a week, wonder what they are paying a doctor? 

This is considered a rural area so again that might make it more difficult to attract a replacement.   This might indicate too that doctor shortages may appear more rapidly in the rural areas of the nation.  BD 

---

BLOOMING PRAIRIE — As far back as H. Peterson can remember, there has always been a clinic or doctor’s office open in Blooming Prairie — something that Peterson, the town’s mayor, says has added to the community’s standard of living.

That all changed this week when Mayo Clinic Health System in Austin — the health care campus through which the Blooming Prairie clinic operated — announced that a staffing shortage has forced the closing of the Blooming Prairie facility, at least on a temporary basis.

“I’m incredibly disappointed,” Peterson said about the announcement. “We’ve worked hard to maintain the clinic.”

And he said, the community itself has expressed what Peterson called “a lot of general disappointment” about the closing, even if it just on a temporary basis.

“She’s the one who was licensed to see patients,” said Tammy Kritzer, the operations administrator for both the Austin and Albert Lea campuses of Mayo Clinic Health System.

Becky Noble, the executive director of the Blooming Prairie Area Chamber of Commerce, said that the closing happened quickly, with most people hearing about the closing on Tuesday and the doors being shut on Wednesday.

http://www.southernminn.com/blooming_prairie_leader/news/local/article_f4d26ae7-c07d-5763-b9f6-af61356950b8.html

Kaiser Permanente IT Center Opens in Colorado–Looking to Add More Employees to Existing Base of 350

This is interesting to watch how different companies in healthcare are expanding in some areas and retreating in other.  Aetna for one pulled out of the Colorado insurance market a while back and they continue to leave other markets.  Just the size of the number of employees should give all an indication today as the time and expense required in healthcare today.  It is something that most may not even think about.  The plan is grow to approximately 700 employees when full staffed.  It sounds like they have all the “green” IT options in place as well.  In Ohio Kaiser is trying to sell their operations by contrast.

Kaiser Permanente Working On Deal to Sell Their Ohio Operations to Catholic Health Partners–Not Making Any Money Here

In addition to Epic Medical Records, Kaiser is a big client with Oracle, relying on their Identity Manager software for security, same as what Harvard and a few other places use.  Video at the link below from the Kaiser IT department along with a couple Oracle related links. 

Kaiser Permanente Using Oracle Access and Identity Manager for Healthcare Security And Some Other Oracle Solutions at Harvard and University of Maryland

What I found interesting as well is the use of the Bloom Boxes by Kaiser and I would guess they are in place here too.  IT/Data  centers use a lot of power.  There’s a 60 Minute segment video at the link below that tells you all about them, EBay, Google and others use them too. 

Kaiser Permanente to Install Bloom Box Fuel Cells at California Facilities

Kaiser is now also one of the largest employers in Colorado and they have plans for more additional clinical medical facilities in the near future.  BD 

---

Nearly 350 employees are now working at the new information technology center opened by Kaiser Permanente in Colorado on Aug. 22. Kaiser officials say they want to fill an additional 95 positions there by year's end.

By 2015, Kaiser Permanente anticipates that some 700 professionals will work at the new IT center. Some of the new positions currently being recruited there include solutions architects, managers/directors, software developers, project/program managers and programmers.

"As healthcare evolves, there is an increased demand for IT solutions and support to deliver quality patient care," said Phil Fasano, executive vice president and chief information officer, in a statement. "This new IT location is a center of excellence where best in class employees use technology to ensure the delivery of high-quality, affordable healthcare to Kaiser Permanente members living in Colorado and across the country."

With more than 6,000 staff in Colorado, Kaiser Permanente is one of the state's largest private employers. This December, it will open a new multi-specialty center in Lone Tree, where approximately 130 positions will be new hires, officials say. As Kaiser adds new membership in Colorado, it's estimated that hundreds of additional jobs could be created in the state in the next three to five years.

http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/new-kaiser-it-center-seeks-fill-jobs?topic=06,17,24

Update on Dr. Afridi–Will Get a New Trial–Helped US Capture Bin Laden and Has Been Jailed Since Then In Pakistan

You have probably seen this and the widget on my blog for a few months now, well today there’s some good news for him.  The New York Times actually adds some new details too that I was not aware of in the fact that he worked with the US CIA for three years on this project.  Now it appears an official in Pakistan says the sentence was too long and the former official handing down the ruling over stepped his bounds.

Doctor Who Helped US Find Bin Laden Sits Jailed in Pakistan–Will Zero Dark Thirty Nominated for an Oscar Help Free America’s Abandoned Hero?–Update

The doctor will get a new trial.  He doesn’t get out though and remains incarcerated until the new trial is done.  Pakistan has suffered some US aid from the US over this issue as well.  BD

---

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A Pakistani judicial official on Thursday overturned the conviction of a Pakistani doctor who helped the C.I.A. while it was searching for Osama bin Laden, and ordered a retrial.

The official, Sahibzada Muhammad Anis, who presided over an appellate court hearing the case, ruled that the tribal judge who convicted the doctor, Shakil Afridi, exceeded his authority when he sentenced him to 33 years in prison in May 2012.

Dr. Afridi’s lawyer, Samiullah Afridi, told reporters gathered outside Mr. Anis’s office in Peshawar, that the court had agreed to a fresh trial under the auspices of the political agent of Khyber, the most senior government official in Dr. Afridi’s home district.

Dr. Afridi’s fate has been a matter of contention between Pakistan and the United States. Leon E. Panetta, who was director of the C.I.A. at the time of the raid, confirmed in early 2012 that Dr. Afridi had played a role in the hunt for Bin Laden and expressed anger at his prosecution. Later, Dr. Afridi’s 33-year prison sentence drew sharp criticism from American congressmen, who cut American aid to Pakistan by $33 million.

American officials say Dr. Afridi was originally recruited to the C.I.A. about three years earlier to provide intelligence about Islamist militants in the Khyber tribal area, where he was working as a senior medical officer.

In Abbottabad, Dr. Afridi used C.I.A. funds to establish a hepatitis vaccination program that allowed his team to approach the house where Bin Laden was staying in a bid to confirm whether he was indeed inside

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/30/world/asia/conviction-of-doctor-who-helped-cia-find-bin-laden-is-overturned.html?_r=0

Hospital Lay Offs Coming Around Again…

Here’s a few of what’s been in the news the last few days…Baptist in Memphis is laying off 61 employees…

Mission Hospital in Asheville is laying off somewhere around 70 employees and they hope to keep it at less than that number…

Big lay off of 500 employees in the Washington state area with PeaceHealth, and you guessed it right, this is not profit chain.  They employ around 6000 employees total.   The Catholic system is facing their largest budget gap in years and part of it was stated to be due to their Health IT purchases.  It’ not cheap, but they are still projecting a profit when all the layoffs take place.  There was also a mention of an cancelled contract with Kaiser Permanente in the Vancouver area that is also adding to the hardship.  

Northshore University Healthsystem in Chicago will laying off 130 employees to cut costs. 

These are just a few in the news the last couple of days and if you go back to around June 1st, you will find many more.  We have been seeing contracts that doctor sign with insurers that are complex and end up reimbursing them at rates lower than Medicare as the AAFP found.

The AAFP Confronts United Healthcare On Reimbursements, Some Are Below Medicare Rates In Parts of the US–Payment Algorithms/Formulas Calculated Deep Within IT Infrastructures Do the Job

Medicare rates initially were lower as doctors and hospitals made up the different on higher insurance payments, but it’s not that way any longer with Medicare in many areas being the highest payer in town.  Medicare could actually sue the insurers for this I think but the repercussions could be huge as all the Medicare contractors are pretty much all subsidiary companies of health insurance companies. Meantime back at the ranch the profits for health insurers keep growing.  Are we looking at yet another return of “Desperate Hospitals” when it comes to money? 

Desperate Hospitals Returns For 2010

What’s going to be the next move when all the big mergers have taken place?  Health IT costs have definitely gone up and some of the subsidiaries of insurers are cashing in there too…take a look at the truckloads of subsidiary companies one company has. 

As I stated before, banks and insurance companies have pretty much just morphed into being powerful software companies that control a lot of money with math models and complex algorithmic formulas for profit.   

Banks Are Actually Just Software Companies and the Same Can Pretty Much Be Said for Health Insurance Companies As Well-5 Unspoken Reasons Tech Projects Fail

American Medical Association Shutting Down AMA News Magazine in September

Both the printed version and the website will close on September 9th.  The magazine has been published for 55 years and there’s a lack of revenue and the inability to show a profit today. Revenue is only a third of what it was 10 years ago.

Drop in advertisers was a big drop, especially from the pharmaceutical industry.  The Journal of the American Medical Association is not affected and will continue as usual as their focus is research with information not available in other places on the web.  BD

---

The American Medical Association, the country's largest professional organization for physicians, is shutting down the news magazine it has published for 55 years.
The publication, which also operates a website at AmedNews.com, has a print circulation of about 230,000 but has had trouble turning a profit over the last decade, amid declining ad revenue from drug companies, increased competition from other news sources and a steady migration of readers to the Internet.

American Medical News will stop publication on Sept. 9, according to the statement. Its website also is shutting down, but the content will be available until the end of the year. The shutdown will affect 20 employees.

Pharmaceutical advertising accounted for the bulk of revenue for American Medical News, Mr. Easley said. In addition to having to compete harder for ad dollars, AM News saw revenue slow to a trickle in recent years as several big-selling drugs went off patent and as drugmakers shifted focus to specialty products, rather than more broad-based blockbuster drugs, he added.

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20130812/INFO/308129991/ama-to-close-news-magazine?AllowView=VW8xUmo5Q21TcWJOb1gzb0tNN3RLZ0h0MWg5SVgra3NZRzROR3l0WWRMWGJYUHdERWxIeU96eTMyWmVqNW40WUpiV2diUll5eGc0TjdTS1VBUDBpaG1hYW84YXJIOUswVUtvQUE2WUc=

United Healthcare Sues Government Contractor, Paragon for Unpaid Health Insurance Premiums

Here’s yet one more lawsuit from United to where they are stating the company did not pay all their premiums in full.  The company, however says it’s not true and they have moved on to another carrier when the United contract expired at the end of 2012.  The case is for over $200,000 and United states their collection efforts were ignored by Paragon.  Paragon Systems is a subcontractor for companies like L3 Communications and General Dynamics. 

Paragon says they fight the battle as high costs and bad service were the reasons they changed.  BD

---

UnitedHealthcare Insurance Co. sued Sterling-based technology company Paragon Systems LLC, claiming Paragon owes more than $200,000 in unpaid premiums on group health care and life insurance policies — claims UnitedHealthcare denies.

Paragon held two UnitedHealthcare policies in 2012 that provided health insurance, life insurance, accidental death, and dismemberment and disability coverage for Paragon employees. According to the complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court in Alexandria Aug. 14, Paragon made payments on premiums "in varying amounts and frequencies" until both policies were canceled Dec. 31, 2012.

http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/fedbiz_daily/2013/08/united-healthcare-sues-paragon-systems.html

Another “Stolen Code” Case on Wall Street Emerges–Hope They Get It Right This Time And Either Prosecute the Case Correctly or Dismiss It-The “Evil” Drop Box Share…

Here we go again and as you might remember the last case against the former Goldman programmer was botched so badly and was never accurately proven.  You certainly can’t find a “jury of peers” from ordinary candidates either and the experts called need to be just that, ones that truly are familiar and know the procedures of how code is written and used.  The State of New York still brought another case against Sergey Aleynikov after a judge threw out the first case.  A jury of common consumers cannot understand all of this, I don’t care what anyone says. It is funny when you read the article about the FBI agent not knowing what “subversion” (SVC) was.  Anyone in programming will laugh their fannies off at reading about it:)

Former Goldman Programmer Sergey Aleynikov Case–Digital Illiteracy of FBI, A Duped Jury-How Goldman Played It And Is Still Not Accountable for Their Own Risk Altering Models…

With what happened to Goldman last week, they might be well advised to look old Sergey up as he appears to also have some real serious software engineering skills too, which was part of the area to where I believe their code ran bad last week and we have not heard yet what the outcome is there and how much money was lost or better yet what the ill fated non tech lawyer running the SEC will do.  Tortoise SVN (image)  is one of the best software SVN  programs out there and it’s open source from Microsoft..

Now these folks were sending and sharing code via Drop Box supposedly to start a business and we need to know exactly what the content was.  People share code modules all the time, I’ve used some and they are ones openly shared and open source code that has been rewritten.  Does is make an entire program for me, no way, it only works in creating a particular module of the bigger picture of all the code together work.  Duh!  People don’t get this and understand the concept.  With Drop Box, who needs (SVN) subversion (grin). 

Now they said they found proof that the recipient had worked and rewritten some of the code and that is was part of a secret algorithm…well if that’s the case better run the code and see what it does as it could be useless. Programmers and developers do stuff like that, they just play around with it and end up dumping it as many times it’s just something to experiment with or you find a new couple of lines of code that make such modules run more efficiently.  Again, remember too that a lot of the trading software is “open source” and Goldman has a one way relationship in the fact that they never give back, which is part of how open source works, you use it and then give some modules and portions back that you develop.  Sure one may not give everything back, and we know they don’t, but it really looks bad if you don’t even give back some beefed up “common” modules that everyone uses.

All I can say is that these cases so far are a joke as far as how they have been handled by digital illiterate lawyers and we all want the truth, and we want accuracy but again as I mentioned above, the case against Sergey was never done correctly and the pending new case is also a joke.  Lawyers are smart and do their research for sure, but unless they code, this is way out of their realm as you never know when you will get an “expert” that will lie to make a case.  Everyone complains about this whether it’s a court case or that IT folks lie to them at some company or a bank.  Some do lie and in other cases it’s a matter of trying to tell the layman what the cause of a very complex issue is and you do have to make up some analogies that they can understand as otherwise they will never get it.  I’ve done that in a good way to help educate so they understand but if you were to look at some of the analogies I have used in the past, someone could take that out of context and call it a lie as well.

That’s what makes all of this so bad and again we are just suffering like crazy by not having a technologist at the top of the helm at the SEC.  Old digital illiterate lawyers believe whatever technologists happen to be on hand and their interpretations are all different as well as different work and education backgrounds will provide that alone.  Being the fact that the two being prosecuted were traders, well I would imagine they were just making some pretty good guesses at what to put in Drop Box, as their expertise is more about dealing with spreadsheets and analytics than code and programming (grin).  All I can say is here we go again with the digital illits in a court case and they better get it right this time as the whole technology world is watching and laughing.  BD 

---

The top prosecutor in Manhattan is seeking to indict three men for allegedly stealing valuable computer source code from an automated trading firm, according to people familiar with the matter.

A criminal complaint filed by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. in New York and seen by The Wall Street Journal alleges that Glen Cressman and Jason Vuu, who worked as traders at Flow Traders US LLC in New York, emailed themselves lines of code that contained secret algorithms at the heart of the firm's high-frequency trading strategy.

Mr. Vuu shared the code with Simon Lu, a college friend from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, through the file-storage service Dropbox, according to the complaint, which accuses the two men of planning to use the secret software to start their own company. Mr. Lu, currently a Ph.D. candidate in mechanical engineering at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, was studying there when he allegedly received the stolen code.

Mr. Vuu's attorney, Jeremy Saland, said he doesn't believe any harm was done to Flow Traders and is still looking into the facts. "I look forward to defending these accusations," he said Sunday.

After searching Mr. Lu's computers, investigators discovered that some of the computer code allegedly stolen from Flow Traders had been manipulated, leading investigators to believe that Mr. Lu had taken steps toward launching his own high-frequency trading platform, according to a person familiar with the matter. Messrs. Lu and Vuu had not set up their own firm.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323980604579031034025132054.html

Man With 132 Pound Scrotum Finally Has Surgery and Gets Relief..Could Not Afford the Cost And Had to Find A Way…

You have to watch the videos and it was almost overnight that his scrotum grew to the size of a melon, and each month afterwards it added on another 3 pounds until it got to the point where it was before surgery.  He was finally able to have the surgery to remove it.  This was a rare condition and again watch the video and see how hard it was for him to get around with this between his legs.  It did nothing for his sex life and he hopes that perhaps maybe with some additional surgical procedures it might come back.

As you can read below, his story will be on the TLC network and perhaps this was where some of the money needed came from so he could have his surgery?  The doctor donated his services if Medicaid would cover the surgery but there’s always something else that comes up with cost.  The condition started 5 years ago and he said if affordable care was more available, then he would not have had to suffer and could have had his surgery sooner before it got this big and painful.  He could no longer wear pants and wore a “hoodie” upside down. 

Here’s another video with an interview after he had his surgery.  BD

 

---

(CNN) — Imagine carrying a bowling ball between your legs that weighs close to 200 pounds. If that image is too much to stomach, continue reading with caution.

Wesley Warren, 49, spent more than four years with this extra burden before having surgery to repair the damage from a rare medical condition called scrotal lymphedema.

When doctors placed the swollen mass they had cut from Warren’s scrotum on the scale, it weighed 132 pounds. That’s not counting the fluid or smaller pieces of tissue the surgeons had also removed from the Las Vegas man.

“There are a lot of people that will look and laugh and stare in shock and awe and amazement,” Warren says as he walks down the street in a preview for TLC’s upcoming show “The Man with the 132-Pound Scrotum.” The one-hour special airs Monday at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
“It’s tough to deal with it, you know, because essentially, this is a sort of living and breathing freak show.”

http://fox13now.com/2013/08/19/the-man-with-the-132-pound-scrotum-unraveling-the-medical-mystery/

Former Goldman Programmer Sergey Aleynikov Case–Digital Illiteracy of FBI, A Duped Jury-How Goldman Played It And Is Still Not Accountable for Their Own Risk Altering Models…

First of all “subversion”..anyone in programming will love the sentence in this article about how it “was suspicious”.  Also in this article you learn that Goldman has a one way relationship with open source code, they take but don’t ever give anything back and that’s what you do with open source code.  Now I understand you may have some modules you keep but to return not even some generic improvements made to code that all banks use? 

Former Goldman Coder Case Still Open As Questions Are Still Surfacing From Those Who Do Not Program or Understand Data Mechanics About What Kind of Code Did He Steal

The FBI agent gets a “crash” course in what to look for…geez…thought the FBI had higher level tech folks hanging around as in something like this, you better get an agent that deal with technology involved.  As I said when this occurred the size of the file would show that it’s not enough to contain enough “secret sauce” as was indicated here.  This is really too bad that we have so many digital duds here who can’t investigate this case properly.  Sure Sergey admitted what he did but had no clue of what kind of digital dud he was dealing with from the FBI and obviously everyone else was just as dumb and of course Goldman took full advantage to build up the “drama queen” scenario taking this way out of context.

With subversion you check code in and out and it may be configured differently at each place but the basics are the same with full on audit trails, so developers can if allowed have a module or two to work on loaded on their own computers as it has to be replicated and checked when the developer is done.  Again the humor with the FBI agent with the word “subversion” is hysterical.  Also worth watching if you want to see some real digital illiteracy is the PBS documentary called “The Untouchables” where you can see DOJ Manny whine and within 5 minutes of listening to him, you can pretty much determine he was in the same boat as this digital dud FBI case here. 

How could the court really determine what was open source and what was proprietary code accurately?  Goldman could have said anything and the judge and jury would have bought it as if you are not a coder, you can be snowed easily and take a look at the Algo Duping page if you want to learn more on that topic.  I said the same thing about Snowden too, he’s a system admin and everyone talked about the case like they were chasing James Bond.  Technologists don’t think and act this way, I was one of the for a while so take my word for it.

It’ worth your while to read the entire Vanity Fair article, at the link at the bottom of this post to learn more.  Read some of the comments too.  This again with digital duds was not handled properly and Goldman jumped on it and they have a few hundred quants that could lay out a story for a non tech FBI Agent to believe.  This guy should be out of jail and the charges dropped and Goldman should be held accountable for their models that hide risk in my opinion.  If you have never seen the Quants of Wall Street video documentary, watch it and see what I mean.  They have done far worse with lying models and cheating code themselves.  BD

---

A month after ace programmer Sergey Aleynikov left Goldman Sachs, he was arrested. Exactly what he’d done neither the F.B.I., which interrogated him, nor the jury, which convicted him a year later, seemed to understand. But Goldman had accused him of stealing computer code, and the 41-year-old father of three was sentenced to eight years in federal prison. Investigating Aleynikov’s case, Michael Lewis holds a second trial.

The Web site Serge had used (which has the word “subversion” in its name) as well as the location of its server (Germany) McSwain clearly found highly suspicious. He also seemed to think it significant that Serge had used a site not blocked by Goldman Sachs, even after Serge tried to explain to him that Goldman did not block any sites used by its programmers, but merely blocked its employees from porn and social-media sites and suchlike. Finally, the F.B.I. agent wanted him to admit that he had erased his “bash history”—that is, the commands he had typed into his own Goldman computer keyboard. Serge tried to explain why he had done this, but McSwain had no interest in his story. “The way he did it seemed nefarious,” the F.B.I. agent would later testify.

What Serge did not yet know was that Goldman had discovered his downloads just a few days earlier, months after he’d made the first of them. They’d called the F.B.I. in haste, just two days before, and then put their agent through what amounted to a crash course on high-frequency trading and computer programming. McSwain later conceded that he didn’t seek out independent expert advice to study the code Serge Aleynikov had taken. (“I relied on statements from Goldman employees.”) He himself had no idea of the value of the stolen code (“Representatives of Goldman told me it was worth a lot of money”) or if any of it was actually all that special (he based his belief that the code contained trade secrets on “representations made by members of Goldman Sachs”).

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/2013/09/michael-lewis-goldman-sachs-programmer