Skip to main content

Blood Drawing gone bad

There were oil painters and water color specialists.  They created some of the famous art and drawing there is.


Then came blood drawings.  This topic is more apt given we are heading into the Halloween night.




There are some parallels in what the current crop of silicon valley scammers are attempting to the ritualistic blood drawing done by the erstwhile Count of Transylvania.




Theranos, a valley startup is in the spot light (I am not sure there is any lime involved so lime light sounds too tart) as a company that came up with a new blood draw sampling technique that would eliminate large scale tube filling prevalent today, to find your platelete counts or why the RBC and WBC were misbehaving and if your liver was about to croak.


The Theranos idea was to do a pin prick on the finger and be done.  Not so fast.  Recent reviews called the start up out on their fairy tale claims and the turtle neck wearing founder and CEO was caught like a deer in headlights.  That she has that as her everyday natural look is confusing to the random observer because it takes away from the whole 'deer in headlight' analogy.


But that aside this drawing is not going to look good if they 'frame' her.


A whos who on the Board of Directors seems to have quickly distanced themselves from this newest valley brilliance.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Of Jims and Johns

Here is another essay on the subject of first names. As in birth names. Or names provided to an offspring at birth. While the developed world tends to shy away from the exotic like Refrigerator or Coca Cola for their new production there is a plethora of Jims and Johns and Bobs or Robs. Speaking of which I do not think there is a categoric decision point at the time of birth if a child will be hereafter called as Bob. I mean have not yet met a toddler called Bob or Rob for that matter. At some point though the parental instinct to mouth out multiple syllables runs out and they switch from calling the crawler Robert to simply Robbie to Rob. Now speaking of - it is strange that the name sounds like something you would not want Rob to do - i.e. Rob anyone. Then why call someone that? After all Rob Peter to Pay Paul is not exactly a maxim to live a young life? Is it? Perhaps Peter or Paul might want to have a say in it? Then there is this matter of going to the John. Why degrad...

But What If We're Wrong?

I attempted to read this book by author Chuck Klosterman backward to forward but it started hurting my brain so I decided to stop and do it like any other publication in the English language.  Start from page 1 and move to the right. Witty, caustic and thought provoking this is a book you want to read if you believe that the status quo might, just might be wrong. At times bordering on being contrarian about most things around us it tries to zero in on the notion of what makes anything believable and certain in our minds.  The fact that there is a fact itself is ironic.  Something analogous to the idea that you can never predict the future because there is no future. Many books and movies have tried to play on this concept - best that I recollect (I think I am) was 'The Truman Show'.  This book by Klosterman attempts to provoke the reader to at least contemplate that what they think they know may be wrong. He uses examples like concept of gravity, and how it ...

Presumptive Society

Today's world is hyper connected.  I am not so sure what it means but you hear it a lot.  It is probably hyper but not sure how connected it is.  Sugar (fermented or not) is available in many ways than before and so getting hyper is easy.  It is probably more a threat than cocaine since it is sold legally. And what is this connected stuff?  Most people I encounter seem disconnected from reality.  So going back to this assumption that we are connected there are subtle and no so subtle instances of how brands and companies and middle men try to portray someone - A linkedin profile for somebody working for X years at a place advertises to the connected network that so and so is CELEBRATING X years @ Such and Such Inc. Do we know if (s)he is celebrating or cringing?  Perhaps a better way to portray will be - So and So LASTED X years @ such & such inc. Then it exhorts the readership to go ahead and congratulate them for this lasting effe...