Observations Along the Path

Perhaps some of these merit longer comment, but not right now.
Advertisers are too focused on the end product to notice how bad they are doing. All the more so in the coming Network Civilization. Think in terms of time preference: How to people want to spend their time? Facebook is a good clue. It gives people what they want, but it won’t make money because the folks running it don’t understand how to make it pay. The Zynga games are a great way to keep them tied into the time channel, but the monetization is utterly clueless. The advertising which works is that which most entertains. You get people to watch your spiels because they want to, because you offer something worth that time with their attention. Visual spam is not worth their time; entertainment is.
People still go to YouTube and actually look up certain old TV commercials because they are still entertaining. Give them a reason to invest their attention.
Bureaucracies have zero interest in what you think and care about. They have a mandate handed down from some other space entirely, and even when they interview you, it’s all being filtered through that narrow set of things they intend to do. They’ll do those things at the cost of your life, and the bureaucrats can be incredibly spiteful and angry when you dare suggest they don’t understand.
In the current context, about the only good moral thing possible for disaster relief is to do what you can to match demand with availability. Giving people what you know in your greatest understanding of human need is pointless if they have no interest in it. Making people accept and use what you have decided they need is hateful, and qualifies you as a justified target of violence. It’s not your concern whether people are demanding things which will kill them. That’s their decision to make. They’ll understand completely if you simply can’t offer what they really want, but if you demand they corral themselves to your agenda, you deserve their hatred.
Part of what we are seeing with the Petraeus affair is the infighting between the FBI and CIA which has been going on for a very long time. Let’s just say: If it was possible to know Petraeus was having an affair recently, it was well documented before he was ever placed as head of the CIA. You can draw your own conclusions about why the system still chose him for the position, but they knew. Personal immorality is so common at the top levels of our system, you should be frankly surprised when there is no evidence of it. Genuinely moral people are the single greatest threat to the system, and such people are simply not allowed to hold power. They may be put in positions where they can be used, but they will not have any real power.
The current ruling clique have been saving up the firing and shuffling of military brass for over a year. Right now we’re seeing a planned purge. While I do not by any means defend the military system, it’s all too easy to understand the perception among military brass things are ripe for a good military coup. From where they stand, it is hard to justify not taking over a very nasty political system which treats them with the utmost contempt.
Most of what you think you know is a lie.