People are flocking to live in cities at an increasing rate

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Revolutionizing Creative Text Generation with Quality-Diversity through AI Feedback

Back in 2019, I made a plea: “ .” In some circles, at least, the argument quickly caught on. This is because, for startup companies, an exit through an acquisition or public offering is the goal that all else points toward. It is the payoff for founders, investors, and early employees. I contended that the roots of the exit as we know it are rotten. Exits turn companies into commodities, and exits often turn those companies against the people who rely on them most. We need a different kind of exit that is just and accountable, an exit to community. Startups Need a New Option: Exit to Community As the E2C meme first spread, I heard from founders and others looking to do a community exit themselves. But I didn’t have a model or a blueprint to offer—just a vision and a story that I hoped we could learn to tell together. To develop the idea, I teamed up with my longtime collaborator . Years before, we had tried to turn Twitter toward community ownership, with that appeared on the company’s 2017 ballot and . (If we had won, perhaps Twitter would still exist.) In early 2020, we started and joined with to run a for founders interested in the idea. We published and , and E2C was featured in . Danny also co-founded the , a group of journalists, marketers, stakeholder engagement specialists, and academics working to advance E2C in practice. In the years since, we have quietly supported and learned from a variety of experiments, helping entrepreneurs push the limits of what is possible. Memes, we believe, will only take us as far as they are backed up by the hard work of courageous pioneers. Danny Spitzberg a provocative shareholder proposal made news worldwide an E2C webinar series Zebras Unite cohort program a zine a trailer video a special on PBS Exit to Community Collective Our “snapshots” are brief, structured case studies that give a taste of the many diverse ways that startups have been trying to grow into community ownership and governance, albeit with mixed results. As a new year arrives, I am thrilled to announce the release of a new library of E2C stories that the E2C Collective has created at . E2C.how The snapshots range from my Colorado neighbors and , which converted to employee ownership, to major open-source software projects like and , which are mini-democracies accountable to their developers. There is , a Chinese electric car company whose founder set aside a chunk of stock for car-buyers, and , a co-op founded by employees who quit their previous job in protest. There are also blockchain-based efforts, like and , that have tried to make good on a new technology’s often-betrayed promises for making a more inclusive economy. Namaste Solar Trident bookstore Debian Python NIO Defector Media Gitcoin SongADAO I have taken two main lessons from these snapshots so far. 1. Entrepreneurs, investors, users, and workers alike are all recognizing the need for a new approach, and they are trying lots of different ways to get it. They are relying on old technology and the latest innovations. They are using many different legal structures and techniques for empowering communities. The resourcefulness is pretty astonishing, really. 2. In just about every case, E2C attempts have faced profound challenges. They are often working at the very edge of what the law allows, because many of our laws were written to serve profit-seeking investors, not communities. Much of what communities wanted was simply not possible. Truly changing the landscape of exits will mean policy change that takes communities seriously as sources of innovation and accountability. There is widespread craving for a better kind of exit—and the creativity to back it up. Better exits need to be easier—and this will require structural change. I want to stress this second point. It first became clear to me when working with collaborators at Zebras Unite on the idea of . The founder wanted it. The business model made perfect sense—a rare platform whose users actually pay for it. The company was up for a fire sale. But we simply could not find investors or lenders prepared to back a deal like that. This is a problem I have seen with many other co-op efforts, over and over. Policy is the most powerful shaping force for where capital can aggregate, and there is no adequate policy to support capital for large-scale community ownership. This is also the reason we have lost many community-owned companies in recent years, from to —the most successful community-owned companies too often can’t access the capital they need to flourish. turning Meetup into a user-owned cooperative New Belgium Brewing Mountain Equipment Co-op I’ve seen the same pattern repeat itself with blockchains, where the E2C idea has taken hold more than anywhere. Blockchains can enable organizations that are collectively owned and governed by their users, and millions of people have been attracted by possibility. But what has happened in practice? Any time a new project started gaining traction, it would become drowned in investment from the same venture-capital firms that fueled earlier kinds of startups. The driving force became not the tech or the communities but the investors, once again. This pattern is not inevitable. History has demonstrated that, with the right policy in place, large-scale capital access for community ownership is possible. That’s what happened after 1936, when the US government passed the Rural Electrification Act; thanks to a (revenue positive!) loan program at the Department of Agriculture, cooperatives now operate nuclear power plants and deliver high-speed Internet in once-underserved areas. In 1974, a relatively small change to the federal tax code unleashed the employee stock ownership plan, or ESOP, which has enabled millions of workers to become co-owners of the companies where they work. Today, most policy that governs taxation and finance is built on the assumption that investor profits at all costs is the norm and the ideal. , this assumption is intolerable. We need to demand changes that reorder how capital is able to be organized and deployed. These changes can be relatively small to make a difference—tweaks to tax codes and securities laws, for instance—and they can win support from diverse constituencies. As Marjorie Kelly powerfully argues Too often, I have come to believe, advocates of cooperatives and community ownership have put their energy downstream of the real policy problems. They focus on gaining access to small loan funds and technical assistance for small companies. But they neglect the upstream challenge of exits—and other endgames for the most successful companies in the economy. Unless we change the options available at the highest levels, any gains that communities make for early-stage companies can be erased once companies grow and need capital at the highest levels. On the other hand, when community ownership flourishes at large scales, that’s an attractor — something the whole rest of the economy can start moving toward. Rather than fighting over crumbs, advocates of community ownership should be asking: What change will we win for community ownership that does for future generations what our predecessors won for us? Historically, major structural change for community ownership has involved a three-step process. First, the experiments: creative, path-breaking people demonstrate the need and the possibility of something better. This is where E2C is right now, and our snapshots portray that experimentation beautifully. Now we need to learn from those experiments, identifying what works and where the barriers lie. Second, the policy: Here’s when we build on the experiments, which hint at what is possible, and try to break down the biggest barriers in the way of unleashing economic justice. We assemble broad coalitions to advocate for achievable change, grounding our stories in the experiences of people who need change the most. And we win. Third, the practice: Policy is only the beginning. What matters more is what we do with it. Here, we need to grow our movements and our culture to use the new policy in the best ways, and we watch out for those who want to exploit our policy—as any policy can be exploited. We spread, and community ownership becomes a new normal. I have hunches about the kinds of policy E2C needs, but above all I am interested in learning from a shared conversation. What paths should we be organizing around? The tax code? Public loan guarantees? Securities exemptions? What would have the greatest effect for community ownership at the most achievable political cost? Four years after first calling for E2C, I have become more convinced than ever that focusing on the exit—the goals the economy sets, not just its entry-points—is the right place to be. I hope more people recognize how vital it is to rethink what startups aim for. Meanwhile, I am grateful for all those who have worked together to make this new phase possible through the E2C Collective. That includes, currently, Hazel Devjani, Adina Glickstein, Valentine Erokhin, Nanz Nair, Marisa Rando, Sheba Rivera, and Eli Zeger. Danny Spitzberg kept the Collective moving when no one else did and. The team is continuing to create resources and support teams exploring their own community exits. These people are weaving a fairer kind of economy into being. Please consider (which is also a company ). supporting their work through Open Collective pursuing an E2C I published my initial call to “exit to community” here because Hacker Noon is a Colorado-based, family-led company; it used an equity crowdfunding campaign to remain independent of conventional venture-capital pressures. Now it is one of our snapshots. Everyone doing E2C today has had to go against the grain of mainstream startup culture, facing unique challenges as a result. Someday, I hope that what Hacker Noon and others have struggled to do will be easier, that building with and for community will be the obvious thing to do. This, we now know, is possible. Artwork by Marcos Osorio, , a worker-owned co-op. via Stocksy

Now We Know: Exit to Community Is Possible

এখন আমরা জানি: কমিউনিটিতে প্রস্থান করা সম্ভব

Jetzt wissen wir: Der Austritt aus der Gemeinschaft ist möglich

Ahora lo sabemos: la salida a la comunidad es posible

Nous savons maintenant : la sortie vers la communauté est possible

अब हम जानते हैं: समुदाय से बाहर निकलना संभव है

今わかったこと: コミュニティへの退出は可能である

이제 우리는 알고 있습니다: 커뮤니티로의 이탈이 가능합니다

Agora sabemos: a saída para a comunidade é possível

Теперь мы знаем: выход в сообщество возможен

Artık Biliyoruz: Topluluğa Çıkış Mümkün

Bây giờ chúng tôi đã biết: Có thể thoát khỏi cộng đồng

现在我们知道：退出社区是可能的

Gemini - A Family of Highly Capable Multimodal Models: Discussion and Conclusion, References

Let me tell you how I came up with the idea of writing this article. “I woke up early last week, grabbed my cup of coffee after a quick shower, and opened up the window to watch the amazing sunrise. At that moment, I asked myself, Why don’t I write an article about B2B content ideation?” That’s it, Wait a second. You don’t seem to believe this story. Well, yeah, you are damn right. I made it up—it is a lie because first of all, I’m not fit for the 5 AM cold-shower club. Plus, there is no way on earth for any content marketer to come up with ideas just with imagination and even brainstorming. The pain of staring at an empty Google Doc with no clue of what to type down is what actually pushed me to write this piece. The idea for this article materialized as a result of me knowing that many content marketers: struggle to come up with content ideas that resonate put themselves in a loop of sharing the same 2015-fashion type of articles spend hours looking for analytics tools instead of jumping on a half an hour call with customers blindly copy competitors’ strategies and messaging search for sales-related-stats instead of recording a sales call think that TOFU content is all about tips and tactics think that content marketing is nothing but keyword research heavily rely on Gen AI and so on… So yeah, that’s what actually made me write this article. I can make this list longer, and I bet you also have something to add, but we won’t be giving a holistic look at the content marketing field in this article. We are going to talk about the way you should think before working on content - the function you should apply to ideate product-led topics and match the points by being intentional with your content. But hey… Why would you listen to me? I’m just a writer who is just getting a foot in the industry. B2B Yes, I have a decent grasp of knowledge on the topic, but it is what experts shared with me that brought on Aha! moment. I will be sharing all of that today. Let me step aside and introduce the experts to you: Lauren Lang, Director of Content and Brand Communications at Constructor 13+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Tom Bangey, Senior Director of Content & Community at Juro 6+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Content Lead at Eric Doty, Dock 8+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Head of Content at Adima Timar, Userpilot 8+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Content Marketing Manager at Tamara Omerovic, Databox 7+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Former Content strategist at Elise Marion, system1 6+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here CEO& Founder at Vince Moreau, ScaleCrush 7+ years of experience in the content field LinkedIn- Here Enough of me, let’s see what experts have to say about their experience. Note: This article is nothing more than real-life experiences gathered for you to improve your thinking and help with planning your next steps. There are no tips. no tactics, and definitely no freaking hacks or shortcuts. Enjoy! On B2B SaaS Content Ideation What is your number 1# source of content ideas and how do you leverage it? Talk to your customers and sales prospects. All the tech tools and AI and competitor analysis can’t beat spending half an hour with a customer finding out about their problems at work. I would try and turn the notes from that conversation into thematic analysis, and also break down the projects and problems they talk about into disaggregated tasks that can be targeted individually or collectively in content. Tom@Juro: Sometimes it’s difficult for marketing to interact with customers for a variety of reasons. In that case, I’ve found the sales team to be my biggest source of content ideas, especially for product-focused content. They are the closest to understanding customer objections, pain points, and questions that influence the purchase decision, and they are used to thinking strategically about how to use whatever tools are at their disposal (including content) to close the deal. Lauren@Constructor: Here is a graphic, CMO&Founder at - shared with me once for an article, which is relevant to Lauren’s last insight: Andy Crestodina - Orbit Media The easiest source of content topics is starting with problems the product solves directly. For example, how to make a sales proposal, how to create a price quote, and why you should use a mutual action plan instead of a spreadsheet. Eric@Dock: Beyond those product-led sources, I also source ideas from: Topics frequently mentioned by guests on our podcast (it’s a good indicator of a trending topic that may not show up in keyword tools yet) Recorded sales calls, customer support tickets, and discussions with our founder Keyword research On Content ideation, Competitive analysis Does your competitive analysis affect your content ideation process? Yes, we analyze competitors and understand what topics they are strongest with and where they are lacking. We also look at content gaps and prioritize keywords based on buying intent, the possibility of showcasing the product in a contextual way, and pillars (we have months when we focus mostly on one or two pillars) Adina@Userpilot: Absolutely. Knowing the strategies and tactics that our competitors are using is critical to finding the places where we can differentiate ourselves in the market. In AI, there is a lot of smoke and mirrors, and there are even more tech buzzwords. Being able to educate customers and help them separate the signal from the noise is incredibly important, but first, you have to understand where your competition is coming from. Lauren@Constructor: Yes and no. Sometimes competitors have good ideas, sometimes they have terrible ideas. When they have good ideas, you can use them. When they don’t, discard their stuff. Vince@ScaleCrush: We do leverage competitive analysis, simply as a shortcut - if they’ve won some valuable traffic for a particular keyword, we can skip the keyword research and planning phase and just create content to target that keyword. Note of caution: a competitor ranking for a keyword is just evidence that they have traffic - not that the traffic itself has any value. Vanity traffic is vanity traffic, even if you take it from competitors! Tom@Juro: I don’t pay too much attention to competition in the ideation process itself. I look at the competition to prioritize my idea to-do list (i.e. what’s most unique). Eric@Dock: On SEO Content Ideation How do you incorporate SEO into your content ideation process? We have a highly focused and ROI strategy. Our blog is responsible for over 80% of the MRR so the focus is on producing BOFU content first and then choosing keywords that help build topical authority around our main pillars. Adina@Userpilot: SEO For any idea or keyword I’m toying with, I’ll normally spend some time in Ahrefs looking at related keywords. I’ll keep my eye out for underserved or low-difficulty keywords. Eric@Dock: But again, SEO plays a bigger factor in how we prioritize which ideas to work on rather than how we come up with ideas. I attach a handful of keywords to each content idea to come up with a rough SEO potential for each idea. I weigh that against other factors like relevance to our product, trendiness or timeliness, and overall just how excited we are about the topic. For our organic channels, we segment our content ideas longlist into high, mid, and low-intent keywords. If you only target high-intent then your website looks a bit spammy, so we mix it up a bit; and then the only logical thing to do is work through the backlog, prioritizing based on search volume, keyword difficulty, and funnel performance of similar pages. Tom@Juro: We do customer & market research, competitive analysis- and existing content audits. That gives us enough to determine overarching topics, which we then do keyword research for. Keyword research is the last step in the process Vince@ScaleCrush: :). We try to keep an eye on SEO, but in retail tech, we’re in a very saturated market where SEO simply doesn’t make sense as our primary distribution channel. We typically create content ideas based on customer needs and then do SEO research to find search terms with similar intent that we can incorporate into the pieces. But customer needs come first. Lauren@Constructor: On Content ideation, Team collaborations Do your teammates in Sales, Customer success, or product development work on content ideas with you, if yes, in what manner they do contribute? We typically collaborate via our preferred project management tool where the dedicated team simply shares their insights in the form of a task. We also have an initiative called “Customer Insights” where the Sales, Account Management, and Onboarding Teams share raw and verbatim insights on things customers say about their use cases, experience, and questions about using the product. Insights are captured through emails, chats, call snippets, and full calls and are available to anyone for product development, content ideation, and more. Tamara@Databox: I would also like to mention that Product Development teams at Databox not only share content ideas with us but also build additional features and tools like online calculators and performance scores to help marketing with lead generation activities directly. Yes — working cross-departmentally is so important in content ideation. You get to use the knowledge accumulated across the customer journey to identify any pain points that may be challenging your customers. You can also focus on important areas of your product that customers may need to be more comprehensively educated on. Using the topics gathered from my team, I use the cumulative knowledge to research keywords that align with those pain points and craft content based on that research. Elise@System1: Yes! Content creation is a team sport. When you’re dealing with enterprise software and a variety of user personas, it’s impossible for content marketing to get as granular as some of the other teams. But it’s in that granularity where the best ideas for content come from, so we often ask our product, sales, and CS teams for ideas and contributions. I’m very intentional about building a collaborative content culture. Lauren@Constructor: Yes, we do also leverage internal knowledge, but you need to take everything with a grain of salt. People have lots of assumptions about the market and sometimes they’re wrong. Vince@ScaleCrush: Our founder wears many of those hats, so most of our ideation takes place as ad hoc casual chats between the two of us. I also meet with our one account executive regularly just to chat about what content would be useful for him to do his job. For example, he might flag that he needs a case study for a particular customer vertical. Eric@Dock: Content strategy is derived from our company master plan and ICP, so there’s no risk that content isn’t aligned with other teams. However, if we’re targeting a specific persona we will sense-check the content by utilizing colleagues who talk to them all the time. For example, when we produce new contract templates for our website- part of what we do at Juro-, we’ll work with our colleagues in CS to make sure they fit with customers—for example, a is one of the most common contracts in Juro, according to customer data, which validates it as a priority for us. If no customers managed SOWs in Juro, it might not be worth ranking for. Tom@Juro: template statement of work On Content ideation, ( Not-to-do’s) What is your not-to-do thing while trying to come up with content ideas? If you need to ask ChatGPT for content ideas then perhaps you don’t know your ICP as well as you think you do! Generative AI can be enormously helpful in parts of the content workflow. Still, top-ranking organic content needs (by definition) to be in the top 0.1% of content, which means it probably can’t be written by a predictive model. Tom@Juro: Don’t blindly rely on keyword research or SEO tools during your content ideation process. The best SEO tool you can use to create powerful and engaging content is actually your brain. Your brain can comprehend the intent behind user search queries better than any tool and come up with creative ideas, unique perspectives, and compelling narratives that resonate with readers, which is a crucial aspect of SEO. Therefore avoid relying too heavily on SEO tools in a way that may stifle creativity or lead to a "copycat" mentality, where you mimic your competitors' content strategies without considering what truly sets your brand apart. Tamara@Databox: The biggest thing is to leave yourself time to come up with ideas. Once you’re on the content flywheel, it’s easy to get stuck in a heads-down production schedule where you never take time to lift your head up and look around for more creative ideas. Eric@Dock: From an SEO perspective, avoid the trap of trying to rank for high-volume, top-of-funnel keywords that don’t relate directly to your product for as long as you can (or at least early in your company’s lifecycle). Start with all the mid-funnel searches your product solves directly. They’ll be easier to rank for and better for lead generation. Too many thought leadership articles that might just bring a bit of traffic in the month but no conversions. Adina@Userpilot: Avoid posting content for the sake of posting it. Content should align with a strategy. Don’t start with keywords in mind - don’t look at search volume too much, and don’t write about something if you don’t think you have expertise. Vince@ScaleCrush: My company is an AI company, so I’m actually very bullish on AI. But I would advise against using ChatGPT to help you come up with original content. By its very nature, ChatGPT is going to rehash only what already exists, which is exactly what you likely shouldn’t be creating in most cases. Great content comes from innovation and creativity, from seeing and filling the gaps in what already exists. Treating content like a commodity will give you commodity content – and commodity content doesn’t stand out or drive conversions. Lauren@Constructor: The bottom line As I told you, no tips and tactics here. Your approach to content ideation is your own tips and tactics. Some articles out there on the SERPs will pull up some stats and facts and tell you to do this and that. although they might be right sometimes, it is none of their goddamn business, it’s yours, your product, and your audience, you decide what works better. There are no plans and standards in the content field anymore, everything is subjective. Rethink and adapt, rethink and adapt, rethink and adapt. And hey! If there is one thing to consider doing from this article, it is 100 percent, talking to your customers. Cheers

Mastering B2B Content Ideation: Insights from 7 Industry Experts

Online advertising has become crucial for a business to thrive in today's digital age. With the ability to reach millions of potential customers through targeted ad campaigns, businesses are investing heavily in their advertising budgets. However, a looming threat can undermine these efforts: ad fraud. In this article, I'll delve into the complex issue of ad fraud and explore its three main types. I’ll teach you to recognize them and guide you on what to do when you suspect any fraudulent activity. Additionally, we'll discuss various ad fraud prevention techniques that businesses can implement to protect themselves and their campaigns. Understanding Ad Fraud Ad fraud refers to any activity that generates fake ad impressions or clicks, tricking advertisers into paying for non-existent or ineffective ad campaigns. The impact of ad fraud on advertising budgets can be devastating, resulting in wasted resources, lost revenue, and damage to brand reputation. Ad fraud is estimated to cost the advertising industry billions of dollars annually. With online marketing becoming increasingly sophisticated and diverse, ad fraud has grown in both scope and complexity. Let’s take a look at the three primary types of ad fraud to watch out for. Click Fraud What is click fraud? Click fraud is a type of ad fraud that involves interfering with user interactions with ads. One typical example is click-spamming, where a fraudster intercepts a real user's click from another source (such as an organic or advertising click) and assigns it to themselves by generating multiple automatic clicks. The user may then install the application, but the analytics system will attribute the installation to the fraudulent partner and not the source. How can you detect it? Fortunately, detecting this type of fraud is easier than the others. One way is by analyzing statistics. Unlike a real user, a fraudster does not download the application, so fictitious actions will show in the numbers. Abnormally frequent user clicks, short intervals between a click and an install, a sharp one-time increase in installs, and, of course, a low conversion rate should alert you. Usually, the figures are compared with the average for the last few months. You can also analyze the source of the traffic to make sure it's diversified, with no single authority responsible for a significant portion of the traffic. However, Apple's privacy policy , which allow users to restrict access to ad interaction data in AppStore apps, have made detecting click fraud more difficult. This means that some data for analysis and fraud detection may not be available. updates Hardware Fraud What is hardware fraud? Fraudsters can use bots that imitate app installs, and I classify this type of fraud as hardware fraud. It is commonly found in gaming apps on Android, as there are many pre-built emulators available. Another way fraudsters engage in hardware fraud is by using virtual machines or cloud servers to simulate multiple devices and generate fake installations. In this case, the fraudster may use different IPs and locations to create the impression that the installs come from different devices and users. How can you detect it? To detect hardware fraud, you can use an anti-fraud system to automatically check the device settings during installation. The system can flag inconsistencies such as incorrect device models or operating systems that don't match the real device. For example, a fraudster may indicate a priority phone or browser model that does not match the device. Detecting the second type of hardware fraud can be more challenging since fraudsters can make the device's characteristics and location appear legitimate. In this case, you might need to run a more thorough analysis of behavior patterns to detect inconsistencies in the data. Behavioral Fraud What is behavioral fraud? This is a rather sophisticated form of ad fraud where bots mimic human behavior and engage with the app. These can also be real people who are paid to perform simple tasks, for example, in dating apps, where ad budgets are spent not only on installations but also on user activity. Another example of behavioral fraud is incentivized traffic, where users are offered rewards or incentives for downloading and using an app. Since these users are only motivated by the reward, this creates a low-quality user base that is unlikely to generate revenue for the advertiser. Numbers of installs and user engagement skyrocket, but there’s hardly any value in them. How can you detect it? Start by analyzing user activity statistics. If user sessions are abnormally frequent, long, or too short, this might be a tell-tale sign you’ve become a victim of fraud. Again, compare these indicators with the last few months’ average values to identify anomalies. Additionally, analyzing the quality and attention of users to the app over time can help to detect incentivized traffic fraud. Platforms Most Affected by Fraud Web First and foremost, there’s web fraud. In essence, it involves generating fake traffic on websites to artificially increase the number of ad impressions, clicks, and conversions. Advertisers pay for this non-existent or low-quality traffic, leading to wasted advertising budgets and decreased ROI. Research shows that web fraud is more prevalent than other forms of online ad fraud, with websites being targeted 25% more often than mobile apps. All types of websites, from news and entertainment to e-commerce and social media, can be affected. However, websites with low traffic volume or lower quality control in their ad networks are more prone to fraud. Video ads are a prime target for fraudsters, accounting for almost of all ad fraud.   A common tactic here is to pass off banner ad space as video placement and sell it at a higher price. 64% Mobile Mobile app fraud is a significant issue in the programmatic ecosystem. , exposure to fraud has skyrocketed by 157% to $5.4 billion worldwide. Unlike desktop fraud, mobile app fraud often operates through downloads from trusted marketplaces such as the App Store or Google Play, making it difficult to detect and prevent. The traditional web fraud tracking model simply wouldn’t work. According to McKinsey One of the most common types of mobile app fraud is click injection. Fraudsters use malware to trigger fake clicks just before an app is installed or updated. The worst part is, these clicks can look like they're coming from real, legitimate users, making it hard to recognize them as fraud. iOS vs Android In 2020, in an effort to combat ad fraud and disruptive advertising, Google removed around 600 Android apps and banned their developers from the Play Store. Naturally, the problem of fraud in mobile advertising affects both iOS and Android platforms, but scammers tend to target Android devices more often because they make up a larger portion of the market. As much as 90% of all mobile ad fraud affects Android. Also, Android devices have higher levels of hardware fraud than iOS devices ( )—they are easier to emulate and have an open-source architecture that makes it easier for fraudsters to generate fake traffic. 37% vs 24% When it comes to the iOS advertising ecosystem, fraudsters find it attractive for different reasons, particularly due to the higher CPM (cost per thousand) rates compared to Android devices. iOS devices actually have a greater share of post-install fraud than Android devices— . The loss of user IDs on iOS can also lead to a rapid increase in fraudulent activity in mobile applications. 55% compared to 34% Non-Gaming Apps vs Mobile Games It appears that non-gaming apps are particularly vulnerable to fraudsters, with financial, travel, and shopping apps being the most targeted. Fraud in non-gaming apps is often carried out by bots, which go unnoticed and target less visible elements of apps and user engagement. In contrast, gaming apps appear to be more immune to fraud, with only 3.8% of game downloads being fake, . This might be because mobile games typically use the CPA (pay-per-action) model for advertising. Yet, click spam and attribution hijacking can still be an issue in gaming apps. according to AppsFlyer CTVs Connected TV ad fraud has emerged alongside the growing popularity of streaming services. One common type of fraud is spoofing, where scammers copy real audiences watching ads on CTV devices. They use techniques like IP, device, SDK, and Server-Side Ad Insertion (SSAI) spoofing to steal ad revenue. According to , the global CTV ad fraud rate rose from 14% in Q2 2021 to 19% in Q2 2022. To combat CTV ad fraud and improve their return on ad spend, advertisers must focus on precise audience targeting, which can help them detect fraudulent activity. Pixalate's research Preventing Ad Fraud Machine Learning in Antifraud Systems Machine learning, with the ability to analyze enormous datasets in real time, is changing the game when it comes to preventing app fraud. One of its key applications is anomaly detection, which means identifying unusual or suspicious activities in an ad campaign. If you train the algorithm over historical ad data, the system will establish a baseline of normal behavior and then spot deviations from this norm. For example, if there's a sudden spike in click-through rates or a disproportionate number of ad impressions from specific geographic locations, it can be flagged as potential fraud. Even more impressively, these advanced algorithms can recognize more subtle forms of fraud, such as click farms and bot traffic, which can easily go unnoticed if traditional detection methods are used. To make anti-fraud systems even more powerful, companies can use a mix of supervised and unsupervised learning techniques. Supervised learning involves teaching the algorithm using labeled data, where fraud instances are explicitly identified, helping the model recognize similar patterns in the future. SML-based systems demostrate good results at detecting already known types of fraud. On the other hand, unsupervised learning doesn't need labeled data; the algorithm autonomously identifies clusters or patterns in the dataset. Such algorithms are more adept at identifying new types of fraud. By combining these two methods, organizations can build resilient and comprehensive anti-fraud tools. Impression Tracking Merely relying on validation methods to ensure that the ad impression is genuine may not always be sufficient—fraudsters can manipulate the system by selectively removing validation pixels from fake impressions while retaining the advertiser's pixels. This is why it's crucial to compare your ad impressions against third-party validator stats and analytics. Also, it's important to use a unique validation pixel for every impression. Some may choose to check every second or third impression to save the budget on monthly limits, but scammers can detect and mimic this frequency, rendering it ineffective. Here's a real-life example that shows how crucial it is to remain vigilant when combatting fraud. I personally know a team that works closely with validators to keep track of discrepancies in ad impressions. When they changed the validation frequency from every second impression to every impression, they noticed a significant surge in invalid traffic coming from a particular publisher, indicating that the previous frequency was intercepted by scammers. Blocking Multiple Requests Rate limiting is an extremely effective way to mitigate bot activity. Essentially this strategy involves monitoring the number of requests and blocking duplicate ones. First, the system tracks the IP address and time between individual requests, which helps to identify the source of a request and restricts processing when a specific IP generates an excessive number of requests within a given time frame. This technique helps prevent DoS and DDoS attacks, web scraping, and botnets. It also reduces the load on web servers and prevents API overuse. Blocklists Another way to combat fraud in advertising is by creating blocklists of vendors and platforms known for spreading fraud. Implementing these lists effectively stops fraudulent traffic from entering the system. Many systems maintain internal blocklists that are updated frequently; also, developers often rely on third-party data. They check databases for parameters such as IP addresses, device information, application IDs, domains, and potentially harmful applications. Real-Time Bidding Real-time bidding allows advertisers to bid on individual ad impressions in real time, ensuring their ads are served to the most relevant users. This increased control minimizes the chances of their ads being displayed on fraudulent websites or being viewed by non-human traffic, e.g. bots. Furthermore, RTB platforms often incorporate advanced security measures and fraud detection tools that help identify and block malicious activities. They constantly monitor and analyze bid requests, capable of promptly detecting patterns indicative of ad fraud, such as abnormal click-through rates or unusual traffic sources. This makes it more difficult for fraudsters to exploit the system. Conclusion The economic impact of fraudulent advertising is staggering. A few years ago pointed out that damages due to ad fraud and spending on bot traffic were expected to rise from $35 billion to $100 billion between 2018 and 2023, reaching over $80 billion in 2022. More recently, the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) reported that the cost of ad fraud has reached an astounding $120 billion annually—the number has already topped Statista’s grim forecast. Advertisers in the United States suffer the most significant financial losses, amounting to $23 billion.__ __Research by indicates that 24% of traffic is generated by bots used for scams and theft. found that 31% of iOS app installs and 25% of Android app installs are fake, while TrafficGuard and Juniper concluded that one in every 13 app installations worldwide is fraudulent. Statista Juniper Interceptd This 2022 data highlights how important it is for businesses and marketing teams to timely detect advertising fraud. Otherwise, they risk spending budgets on bots and fake traffic instead of potential customers. We also need to keep in mind that since programmatic advertising is developing rapidly, effective detection processes for fraudulent traffic may take time to catch up. Let's recap the strategies advertisers can use to combat fraud: Use systems powered by a combination of supervised and unsupervised ML. Install advanced analytics and traffic inspection tools to get more data for attribution analysis. Cross-reference data from different sources, e.g. verify proprietary data against that of third-party validators. Implement rigorous screening processes using blocklists of fraudulent and suspicious traffic, regularly updating and cross-referencing these lists with third-party vendors. Employ impression tracking and filters to ensure the safety of advertising traffic. Sources BotFAQtor Blog, 3 Reasons to Protect Your Ad Campaign from Fraud in 2023, https://botfaqtor.ru/blog/3-dovoda-v-polzu-zashchity-reklamy-ot-onlayn-moshennichestva-v-2023-godu/ VC.ru, Top 10 Tools to Combat Click Fraud by Maksim Kulgin, https://vc.ru/services/617098-top-10-servisov-pomogayushchih-borotsya-so-sklikivaniem-v-reklame Admon.ai for VC.ru, Everything You Wanted to Know about Web and Mobile Ad Fraud But Didn’t Dare to Ask, https://vc.ru/marketing/446864-moshennichestvo-v-onlayn-reklame-vse-chto-vy-hoteli-znat-o-frode-v-vebe-i-mobayle-no-boyalis-sprosit VC.ru, How to Recognize Ad Fraud, https://vc.ru/promo/467877-fraud-online OneSpan Blog, Preventing Fraud, https://www.onespan.com/ru/topics/predotvrasenie-mosennicestva My Tracker Blog, The Ultimate Guide to Identifying and Preventing Mobile Ad Fraud by Ivan Mazharov, https://tracker.my.com/blog/216/the-ultimate-guide-to-identifying-and-preventing-mobile-ad-fraud?lang=en#:\~:text=SDK Spoofing,or%2C potentially%2C engagement signals VC.ru, A Guide to Preventing Ad Fraud: How to Run Secure Advertising Campaigns?  by Yaroslav Kholod, https://vc.ru/marketing/159440-gayd-po-borbe-s-reklamnym-frodom-kak-obezopasit-kampanii-ot-moshennichestva PWC, PwC’s Global Economic Crime and Fraud Survey 2022, https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/services/forensics/economic-crime-survey.html Apple Developer Support Articles, User Privacy and Data Use, https://developer.apple.com/app-store/user-privacy-and-data-use/ Business of Apps, Ad Fraud Statistics (2023) by Artyom Dogtiev, https://www.businessofapps.com/ads/ad-fraud/research/ad-fraud-statistics/

Ad Fraud Prevention: How to Protect Your Online Advertising Budget

As states rush to enact laws criminalizing abortion-related care in the wake of the Supreme Court’s recent decision overturning Roe v. Wade, health advocates and civil rights groups are warning that school surveillance software can be weaponized against teens who seek reproductive care. In tens of thousands of schools, every message students send or term they search on their computer is algorithmically monitored by software from companies like Bark, Gaggle, GoGuardian, and Securly. These tools monitor many students even outside of school hours and can send automatic alerts to school administrators, parents, or police when they detect dangerous behavior, which may range from imminent suicide threats to “sexual content.” By adding a few keywords to a watchlist, civil rights experts say, schools could easily instruct the programs to flag students looking for information about abortions or other . newly illegal health care services “School admin, staff, parents, or other adults who have access to the admin consoles are able to see everything,” said Daly Barnett, a staff technologist with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “The way these applications can be deputized to specifically gather information around searches for reproductive health is alarming.” The way these applications can be deputized to specifically gather information around searches for reproductive health is alarming. Daly Barnett, Electronic Frontier Foundation Nicole, a high school student in Austin who asked that her full name not be used, told The Markup that much of her knowledge about abortion and reproductive health was self-taught online. “Regardless of whether or not I live in Texas, [the internet] gives me a little bit of access,” she said. Websites that discreetly ship medication are —albeit still illegal—ways to access abortion in the state, which has not only criminalized abortion but has also enacted a law that against anyone who helps another person end their pregnancy. one of the few allows private citizens to file civil lawsuits Nicole said her school gives a computer to each student who needs or wants one and that each device comes pre-installed with GoGuardian. The software allows teachers to view students’ screens in real time, access their search histories, and monitor their messages. GoGuardian sends email alerts to administrators when it detects content related to drugs, alcohol, or harassment, according to the . Other alerts, including those for “sexual content,” go directly to the district’s police department. Austin Independent School District’s policy The policy doesn’t define sexual content, and Anastasia Drabicky, a spokesperson for Austin ISD, said the district was closed for the week so staff could not respond to questions. Last year, the algorithmic filters used by the student monitoring company, Securly, were found to be as pornography, adult content, and hate speech. mislabeling sexual health resources Nicole told The Markup that she hadn’t known GoGuardian was sending alerts to the district’s police. Digital evidence trails were a concern for reproductive rights advocates even before the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In 2015, a jury convicted an Indiana woman of feticide through self-induced abortion, based in part on text messages she sent to a friend. Her conviction was on appeal. eventually overturned In 2017, prosecutors charged an Ohio woman with killing her stillborn baby, using her as evidence. A jury acquitted the woman of the most serious charges. internet browsing history And In 2018, a Mississippi grand jury indicted a woman for the murder of her stillborn baby after the her Google search history for abortion pills. Those charges were eventually dropped after civil rights groups rallied to the woman’s defense. prosecution presented But with states now free to enforce , the bar for securing convictions in future cases may be lower. punitive abortion laws Tech companies about how and when they’ll turn over user data to police in abortion cases, adding to to data from tools like period trackers. have been largely silent fears about who will be given access Kendra Albert, a clinical instructor at Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic, said but that the greater legal threat is likely to come from surveillance systems that are already in place and can easily be adapted to the new laws—like student monitoring software. those fears are not baseless We have seen … school districts that consider it their mission to police and out students. Kendra Albert, Harvard Law’s Cyberlaw Clinic “I’m always more worried about times when you just add more keywords to the system compared to times when you have to build the whole system from scratch,” Albert said. “We have seen, especially in red states, school districts that consider it their mission to police and out students, and there can be school-to-prison-pipeline consequences to that.” The Markup reached out to popular student monitoring companies Bark, Gaggle, GoGuardian, and Securly with questions about how they monitor sexual health content and share information with law enforcement. Bark was the only company to respond. “Our AI flags and alerts the content then forwards it to the appropriate contact at the schools,” Adina Kalish, a spokesperson for the company, wrote in an email. “Bark serves to detect and alert only, and cases that require further involvement from law enforcement are handled by the schools directly.” “Bark does not supply student information to law enforcement,” Kalish added. “Schools handle this directly when an issue of concern is identified.” However, according to , the company reserves the right to turn over users’ data “if the information is provided to comply with the law, applicable regulations, governmental and quasi-governmental requests, court orders or subpoenas.” Bark’s privacy policy The fear is very much there that anything we do has to go through a legal lens. Z Zenobia, student organizer, URGE Z Zenobia, a student organizer with the nonprofit Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity (URGE), said young people are experienced at adapting to unsafe online spaces—using coded language and finding other ways to subvert technology. But they need to know they’re being surveilled in order to do that, and Zenobia said they fear that the sheer ubiquity of surveillance in schools will scare some people away from seeking health information entirely. “A lot of people don’t know that Plan B doesn’t work for people over 180 pounds,” Zenobia said, referencing the drug’s . effective weight limit “Anyone trying to access that who is being surveilled is basically in danger at this point. The fear is very much there that anything we do has to go through a legal lens.” Written by Todd Feathers Also published here Photo by on MChe Lee Unsplash

Could School Surveillance Tools Put Teens at Risk?

The Evolution of Modern Medicine, by William Osler is part of HackerNoon’s Book Blog Post series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . here CHAPTER II — GREEK MEDICINE OGRAIAE gentis decus! let us sing with Lucretius, one of the great interpreters of Greek thought. How grand and how true is his paean! Browning's famous poem, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came," is an allegory of the pilgrimage of man through the dark places of the earth, on a dismal path beset with demons, and strewn with the wreckage of generations of failures. In his ear tolled the knell of all the lost adventurers, his peers, all lost, lost within sight of the dark Tower itself— lost in despair at an all-encircling mystery. Not so the Greek Childe Roland who set the slug-horn to his lips and blew a challenge. Neither Shakespeare nor Browning tells us what happened, and the old legend, Childe Roland, is the incarnation of the Greek spirit, the young, light-hearted master of the modern world, at whose trumpet blast the dark towers of ignorance, superstition and deceit have vanished into thin air, as the baseless fabric of a dream. Not that the jeering phantoms have flown! They still beset, in varied form, the path of each generation; but the Achaian Childe Roland gave to man self-confidence, and taught him the lesson that nature's mysteries, to be solved, must be challenged. On a portal of one of the temples of Isis in Egypt was carved: "I am whatever hath been, is, or ever will be, and my veil no man has yet lifted." The veil of nature the Greek lifted and herein lies his value to us. What of this Genius? How did it arise among the peoples of the AEgean Sea? Those who wish to know the rock whence science was hewn may read the story told in vivid language by Professor Gomperz in his "Greek Thinkers," the fourth volume of which has recently been published (Murray, 1912; Scribner, 1912). In 1912, there was published a book by one of the younger Oxford teachers, "The Greek Genius and Its Meaning to Us,"(1) from which those who shrink from the serious study of Gomperz' four volumes may learn something of the spirit of Greece. Let me quote a few lines from his introduction: "Europe has nearly four million square miles; Lancashire has 1,700; Attica has 700. Yet this tiny country has given us an art which we, with it and all that the world has done since it for our models, have equalled perhaps, but not surpassed. It has given us the staple of our vocabulary in every domain of thought and knowledge. Politics, tyranny, democracy, anarchism, philosophy, physiology, geology, history—these are all Greek words. It has seized and up to the present day kept hold of our higher education. It has exercised an unfailing fascination, even on minds alien or hostile. Rome took her culture thence. Young Romans completed their education in the Greek schools.... And so it was with natures less akin to Greece than the Roman. St. Paul, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, who called the wisdom of the Greeks foolishness, was drawn to their Areopagus, and found himself accommodating his gospel to the style, and quoting verses from the poets of this alien race. After him, the Church, which was born to protest against Hellenism, translated its dogmas into the language of Greek thought and finally crystallized them in the philosophy of Aristotle." Whether a plaything of the gods or a cog in the wheels of the universe this was the problem which life offered to the thinking Greek; and in undertaking its solution, he set in motion the forces that have made our modern civilization. That the problem remains unsolved is nothing in comparison with the supreme fact that in wrestling with it, and in studying the laws of the machine, man is learning to control the small section of it with which he is specially concerned. The veil of thaumaturgy which shrouded the Orient, while not removed, was rent in twain, and for the first time in history, man had a clear vision of the world about him—"had gazed on Nature's naked loveliness" ("Adonais") unabashed and unaffrighted by the supernatural powers about him. Not that the Greek got rid of his gods—far from it!—but he made them so like himself, and lived on terms of such familiarity with them that they inspired no terror.(2) Livingstone discusses the Greek Genius as displayed to us in certain "notes"—the Note of Beauty—the Desire for Freedom—the Note of Directness—the Note of Humanism—the Note of Sanity and of Many-sidedness. Upon some of these characteristics we shall have occasion to dwell in the brief sketch of the rise of scientific medicine among this wonderful people. We have seen that the primitive man and in the great civilizations of Egypt and Babylonia, the physician evolved from the priest—in Greece he had a dual origin, philosophy and religion. Let us first trace the origins in the philosophers, particularly in the group known as the Ionian Physiologists, whether at home or as colonists in the south of Italy, in whose work the beginnings of scientific medicine may be found. Let me quote a statement from Gomperz: "We can trace the springs of Greek success achieved and maintained by the great men of Hellas on the field of scientific inquiry to a remarkable conjunction of natural gifts and conditions. There was the teeming wealth of constructive imagination united with the sleepless critical spirit which shrank from no test of audacity; there was the most powerful impulse to generalization coupled with the sharpest faculty for descrying and distinguishing the finest shades of phenomenal peculiarity; there was the religion of Hellas, which afforded complete satisfaction to the requirements of sentiment, and yet left the intelligence free to perform its destructive work; there were the political conditions of a number of rival centres of intellect, of a friction of forces, excluding the possibility of stagnation, and, finally, of an order of state and society strict enough to curb the excesses of 'children crying for the moon,' and elastic enough not to hamper the soaring flight of superior minds.... We have already made acquaintance with two of the sources from which the spirit of criticism derived its nourishment—the metaphysical and dialectical discussions practiced by the Eleatic philosophers, and the semi-historical method which was applied to the myths by Hecataeus and Herodotus. A third source is to be traced to the schools of the physicians. These aimed at eliminating the arbitrary element from the view and knowledge of nature, the beginnings of which were bound up with it in a greater or less degree, though practically without exception and by the force of an inner necessity. A knowledge of medicine was destined to correct that defect, and we shall mark the growth of its most precious fruits in the increased power of observation and the counterpoise it offered to hasty generalizations, as well as in the confidence which learnt to reject untenable fictions, whether produced by luxuriant imagination or by a priori speculations, on the similar ground of self-reliant sense-perception."(3) The nature philosophers of the Ionian days did not contribute much to medicine proper, but their spirit and their outlook upon nature influenced its students profoundly. Their bold generalizations on the nature of matter and of the elements are still the wonder of chemists. We may trace to one of them, Anaximenes, who regarded air as the primary principle, the doctrine of the "pneuma," or the breath of life—the psychic force which animates the body and leaves it at death—"Our soul being air, holds us together." Of another, the famous Heraclitus, possibly a physician, the existing fragments do not relate specially to medicine; but to the philosopher of fire may be traced the doctrine of heat and moisture, and their antitheses, which influenced practice for many centuries. There is evidence in the Hippocratic treatise peri sarkwn of an attempt to apply this doctrine to the human body. The famous expression, panta rhei,—"all things are flowing,"—expresses the incessant flux in which he believed and in which we know all matter exists. No one has said a ruder thing of the profession, for an extant fragment reads: ". . . physicians, who cut, burn, stab, and rack the sick, then complain that they do not get any adequate recompense for it."(4) The South Italian nature philosophers contributed much more to the science of medicine, and in certain of the colonial towns there were medical schools as early as the fifth century B.C. The most famous of these physician philosophers was Pythagoras, whose life and work had an extraordinary influence upon medicine, particularly in connection with his theory of numbers, and the importance of critical days. His discovery of the dependence of the pitch of sound on the length of the vibrating chord is one of the most fundamental in acoustics. Among the members of the school which he founded at Crotona were many physicians. who carried his views far and wide throughout Magna Graecia. Nothing in his teaching dominated medicine so much as the doctrine of numbers, the sacredness of which seems to have had an enduring fascination for the medical mind. Many of the common diseases, such as malaria, or typhus, terminating abruptly on special days, favored this belief. How dominant it became and how persistent you may judge from the literature upon critical days, which is rich to the middle of the eighteenth century. One member of the Crotonian school, Alcmaeon, achieved great distinction in both anatomy and physiology. He first recognized the brain as the organ of the mind, and made careful dissections of the nerves, which he traced to the brain. He described the optic nerves and the Eustachian tubes, made correct observations upon vision, and refuted the common view that the sperma came from the spinal cord. He suggested the definition of health as the maintenance of equilibrium, or an "isonomy" in the material qualities of the body. Of all the South Italian physicians of this period, the personality of none stands out in stronger outlines than that of Empedocles of Agrigentum—physician, physiologist, religious teacher, politician and poet. A wonder-worker, also, and magician, he was acclaimed in the cities as an immortal god by countless thousands desiring oracles or begging the word of healing. That he was a keen student of nature is witnessed by many recorded observations in anatomy and physiology; he reasoned that sensations travel by definite paths to the brain. But our attention must be confined to his introduction of the theory of the four elements—fire, air, earth and water—of which, in varying quantities, all bodies were made up. Health depended upon the due equilibrium of these primitive substances; disease was their disturbance. Corresponding to those were the four essential qualities of heat and cold, moisture and dryness, and upon this four-fold division was engrafted by the later physicians the doctrine of the humors which, from the days of Hippocrates almost to our own, dominated medicine. All sorts of magical powers were attributed to Empedocles. The story of Pantheia whom he called back to life after a thirty days' trance has long clung in the imagination. You remember how Matthew Arnold describes him in the well-known poem, "Empedocles on Etna"— a quotation which will give you an idea of some of the powers attributed to this wonder-working physician. But of no one of the men of this remarkable circle have we such definite information as of the Crotonian physician Democedes, whose story is given at length by Herodotus; and his story has also the great importance of showing that, even at this early period, a well-devised scheme of public medical service existed in the Greek cities. It dates from the second half of the sixth century B.C.—fully two generations before Hippocrates. A Crotonian, Democedes by name, was found among the slaves of Oroetes. Of his fame as a physician someone had heard and he was called in to treat the dislocated ankle of King Darius. The wily Greek, longing for his home, feared that if he confessed to a knowledge of medicine there would be no chance of escape, but under threat of torture he undertook a treatment which proved successful. Then Herodotus tells his story—how, ill treated at home in Crotona, Democedes went to AEgina, where he set up as a physician and in the second year the State of AEgina hired his services at the price of a talent. In the third year, the Athenians engaged him at 100 minae; and in the fourth, Polycrates of Samos at two talents. Democedes shared the misfortunes of Polycrates and was taken prisoner by Oroetes. Then Herodotus tells how he cured Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus and wife of Darius, of a severe abscess of the breast, but on condition that she help him to escape, and she induced her husband to send an expedition of exploration to Greece under the guidance of Democedes, but with the instructions at all costs to bring back the much prized physician. From Tarentum, Democedes escaped to his native city, but the Persians followed him, and it was with the greatest difficulty that he escaped from their hands. Deprived of their guide, the Persians gave up the expedition and sailed for Asia. In palliation of his flight, Democedes sent a message to Darius that he was engaged to the daughter of Milo, the wrestler, who was in high repute with the King.(6) Plato has several references to these state physicians, who were evidently elected by a public assembly: "When the assembly meets to elect a physician," and the office was yearly, for in "The Statesman" we find the following:(7) "When the year of office has expired, the pilot, or physician has to come before a court of review" to answer any charges. The physician must have been in practice for some time and attained eminence, before he was deemed worthy of the post of state physician. "If you and I were physicians, and were advising one another that we were competent to practice as state-physicians, should I not ask about you, and would you not ask about me, Well, but how about Socrates himself, has he good health? and was anyone else ever known to be cured by him whether slave or freeman?"(7a) All that is known of these state physicians has been collected by Pohl,(8) who has traced their evolution into Roman times. That they were secular, independent of the AEsculapian temples, that they were well paid, that there was keen competition to get the most distinguished men, that they were paid by a special tax and that they were much esteemed—are facts to be gleaned from Herodotus and from the inscriptions. The lapidary records, extending over 1000 years, collected by Professor Oehler(8a) of Reina, throw an important light on the state of medicine in Greece and Rome. Greek vases give representations of these state doctors at work. Dr. E. Pottier has published one showing the treatment of a patient in the clinic.(8b) That dissections were practiced by this group of nature philosophers is shown not only by the studies of Alcmaeon, but we have evidence that one of the latest of them, Diogenes of Apollonia, must have made elaborate dissections. In the "Historia Animalium"(9) of Aristotle occurs his account of the blood vessels, which is by far the most elaborate met with in the literature until the writings of Galen. It has, too, the great merit of accuracy (if we bear in mind the fact that it was not until after Aristotle that arteries and veins were differentiated), and indications are given as to the vessels from which blood may be drawn. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved April 2022 from Osler, William. 2006. The Evolution of Modern Medicine. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1566/1566-h/1566-h.htm#link2HCH0002 This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html Photo by on National Cancer Institute Unsplash

The Evolution of Modern Medicine: Chapter II - GREEK MEDICINE

So let’s start! Tell us a bit about yourself. For example, name, profession, and personal interests. Hello HN folks! I am , a long-time . After 10+ years in enertech, I am now building up , my own company. Carlo Occhiena Hackernoon writer Aziona Interesting! What was your latest Hackernoon Top story about? I just wrote about the Metaverse and its connection to tech and blockchain. Read the story here: https://hackernoon.com/metaverse-and-blockchain-will-have-a-parallel-future?source=rss Do you usually write on similar topics? If not, what do you usually write about? I really like writing for Hackernoon because it allows me to write on many different topics - as long as they’re tech-related! I am enjoying this freedom at the moment. I wrote about programming, Agile methodologies, blockchain, Python, and more! I feel like the main advantage of Hackernoon over its competitors it’s the fact you may find a lot of very good and also very different stories here! Great! What is your usual writing routine like (if you have one?) I have a notepad where I track all the inspo and sources I stumble upon. And then, connecting the dot, I try to craft a story out of them. It’s like putting a lot of different ingredients in a blender and then, once in a while, let them mix up and see what is coming out. I like this approach cause it allows you to have a lot of ideas and inspiration and in the meantime to write something interesting and quite fresh. The risk otherwise is to write and same old and trite story over again. Being a writer in tech can be a challenge. It’s not often our main role, but an addition to another one. What is the biggest challenge you have when it comes to writing? I feel like the main issue is being consistent. Trying to be focused enough to develop an expertise, but at the same time have a decent variety of topics - otherwise, you’ll be just writing over yourself. But in the end, I don’t want to overcomplicate the task. It’s basically a matter of practice and exercise. Doing it over and over again until it starts happening - if not easy, then natural, at least to you. As you said, also time is quite a challenge. A lot of us Hackernoon writers have to deal with stressful tech jobs in big companies or startups. Writing then is on top of it all and it’s not too easy to always be able to carve out some time to do it decently. Keep also in mind that for non-native English writers such me (and many other Hackolytes), the task of writing is even harder, you have to double-check grammar and verbs. It’s not an easy task, definitely :) What is the next thing you hope to achieve in your career? Since I just founded my startup, , I am very focused on making it grow and prosper. Aziona But other than that, my last ten years of work have been incredible and I never thought I would be able to achieve all these milestones. So now running my own company is "just" yet another challenge. Wow, that’s admirable. Now, something more casual: What is your guilty pleasure of choice? I am quite basic. Sitting in front of my computer is my day-to-day job but also my pleasure. I am really enjoying what I am doing. To unwind a little I usually watch some or some videogame stream on Twitch. The Big Bang Theory But, really, if there’s something you like doing, you should never feel “guilty” about doing it. Isn’t it? :) Do you have a non-tech-related hobby? If yes, what is it? Not really. I am addicted to sports (running, crossfit) but those are not really hobby to me. I am not the kind of guy that says, “hey, I really need to stop sitting in front of the computer”. It’s something I like a lot. I also love to study and learn new things, but this is not a hobby either and it’s again tech-related, so, I am sorry: not the right question for me :D What can the Hackernoon community expect to read from you next? I don’ really know (my last article has been published just yesterday!). I’ll see where the inspiration will lead me! I also like a lot to interact in the HN community, read other stories and such, so, I’ll just be enjoying the moment. Thanks for taking time to join our “Meet the writer” series. It was a pleasure. Do you have any closing words? Work hard, but have fun along the way! Cheers.

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