from Rippple's Blog

Stay entertained thanks to our Weekly Tracker giving you next week's Anticipated Movies & Shows, Most Watched & Returning Favorites, and Shows Changes & Popular Trailers.

Anticipated Movies

Anticipated Shows

Returing Favorites

Most Watched Movies this Week

Most Watched Shows this Week

Hi, I'm Kevin 👋. I make apps and I love watching movies and TV shows. If you like what I'm doing, you can buy one of my apps, download and subscribe to Rippple for Trakt or just buy me a ko-fi ☕️.

 
Read more...

from CrystalComet

~vengeance~

Perry was standing over the bathroom mirror, hands gripping the cracked porcelain as his breathing faltered.

Deep breaths, Percy. Deep breaths.

He stood upright, smoothing his hair back and loosening his necktie. Almost immediately, he felt the swell of bile in the back of his throat. He doubled over, throwing up chunks of last night’s dinner into the sink. His suit survived, miraculously, and he turned to the toilet bowl for the next wave. As the nausea faded, he turned the tap on with a shaky hand, washing the upchuck down the sink and bringing some water to his lips, swishing it around in his mouth to rinse out the last dregs before spitting into the sink.

“Get it together man…” he muttered to himself.

“He has your son…” he speaks through gritted teeth, hands clenching as he remembers what all this is for. He feels his body tense, flooded with barely restrained rage.

His hands wrap around the glossy wood of the pistol grip, the gun stashed in his suit jacket. His father’s .44 revolver, 1 round in the chamber, hammer cocked. He could hear his father scolding him for such improper gun safety. Sorry, dad.

He stepped out of the bathroom, composing himself as he steps slowly through the abandoned warehouse. His phone pings. It’s the gps tracker. His phone finally triangulated his son’s position. 50 paces east.

He rushed over, seeing his boy restrained in a metal chair, bloodied and beaten. His heart sank as he slowly panned up to his captor – Thomas, his ow business partner.

“I… trusted you. I loved you. Like a brother. You were in my home. You ate at my table…” Perry said, with a seething, slow tone.

“It’s business, Perry. Someone in your corner is just another back to stab a knife through.” He replied in a starkly cold demeanour. He steps closer, swirling whiskey around the tumbler in his hands.

“You had every chance to join me. You going to reconsi-“

bang

Smoke emanates from the barrel. A high pitched shrill whines in Perry’s ears. And blood drips from the chest of Thomas. The glass slips from his hands, and he drops to the ground.

Perry rushes forward, hugging his son close.

 
Read more... Discuss...

from Olhar Convexo

Quantas vezes hoje você já foi ofertado a fazer uma assinatura mensal para sua maior conveniência e para deixar de ver anúncios? Se já acessou algum aplicativo hoje, provavelmente já foi ofertado.

O fenômeno que trago neste texto é o que chamo de Síndrome de Estocolmo Digital. – Neste estágio, você já aceitou o sequestro financeiro por esses aplicativos – e já está acostumado.

A Síndrome de Estocolmo Digital é um instrumento psicológico cruel porque ela é baseada em ameaçar remover um serviço que você considera essencial (mesmo que não seja) e está assinando e pagando por ele — mesmo que não possa pagar por ele.

Vivemos um momento estarrecedor na economia cotidiana: tudo o que antes era gesto simples — baixar um app, ouvir uma música — agora exige uma assinatura mensal.

A normalização desse modelo aconteceu sem debate público, sem regulação, sem questionamentos.

A promessa era sedutora: pagar R$ 1,99 e ter acesso ilimitado. Mas o acesso ilimitado rapidamente se transformou em dependência psicológica. – Sim, como um medicamento controlado.

Hoje, parte significativa da nossa vida existe sob o risco de expiração: não pagou, não acessa. Todos viramos Reféns.

O mais intrigante é o aspecto emocional que se formou em torno dessas cobranças. Não compramos apenas um app — compramos a sensação de segurança que ele entrega.

A nuvem que guarda fotos que nunca acessamos. O editor que usamos duas vezes no mês, mas que é importante estar sempre pronto para uso – afinal, vai que tiro uma foto legal?!

A ausência do acesso garantido causa a sensação de desamparo e desespero.

Pagamos muito pouco por utilidade real – e muito mais por conforto psicológico.

O medo de perder é muito mais rentável do que o prazer de ganhar.

Você não paga para receber algo novo. Você paga para continuar tendo aquilo que sempre foi seu.

E essa dinâmica cria um paradoxo importante: quanto mais dependentes das ferramentas digitais nos tornamos, mais caro fica para apenas “funcionar” no mundo contemporâneo. Onde vamos parar?!

A vida, antes era dividida entre despesas essenciais e supérfluos. Agora inclui uma terceira categoria: as assinaturas que você nem lembra de ter, mas tem medo e sente aflição só de pensar em cancelar.

O foco não é mais o preço, e também deixou de ser conquistar o usuário e virou fazer ele iniciar uma assinatura e permanecer sendo assinante, mês após mês. Hoje, eles não tentam mais ser melhores que os concorrentes como antigamente – a assinatura tem o mesmo preço do concorrente, falando nisso…

Estamos lidando com verdadeiros cartéis!

E assim seguimos, pagando mensalidades para acessar versões premium. Estamos começando a avançar, mas seguimos aceitando pagar continuamente pelo direito de continuar avançando.

Somos nós que escolhemos nossas ferramentas — ou as ferramentas que nos escolhem como fonte de renda?!

Para ter acesso ao próximo artigo de opinião, você consegue pagando apenas R$ 29,99! Vai perder essa mega promoção???*

*Informação falsa

Rio de Janeiro, 16 de novembro de 2025, às 08:04.

Atualizado às 08:07.

 
Leia mais... Discuss...

from Bloc de notas

buenos días / dijo la inteligencia artificial pero él entendió que se lo decía y aunque notó algo extraño con el tiempo le pareció normal

 
Leer más...

from Rob Galpin

I am, these days, more at home here.

Though perhaps more forgetful.

Beyond the walls, the winds blow cold in the treeless baileys.

I sit as still as I am able. The badger rootles

through the rotting, fallen books.

 
Read more... Discuss...

from An Open Letter

It's been hard to get back into the gym recently. I’ve had a lot of off days recently and the lack of endorphin rush makes it really difficult. I feel like I'm consistently low on energy and especially with it getting dark so fast it's hard to find motivation.

 
Read more...

from wystswolf

A thousand butterflies swarm the blooming lavender. The swish of wings little more than a hush of silence. Flitting to and fro supping from the waning nectar and Gleefully bounding away in to the sunset to Find a perch whereupon to spend the coming night.

Wolfinwool · Lavender and Little Women-esv2-90p-bg-10p

The Beginning

The day began brilliant, as most days do here in Dust Meridian. Fall and winter are fine times of the year with cool, dry weather most days that is inspired and close to perfect. I launched into the day by trundling around in the ankle deep dried mulberry leaves the two trees in the hard so lovingly dropped. Ankle deep, and still is seems the trees are full. There will be good crunching for long, long days to come.

As we do traditionally, my wife and I set out in to the ministry to find those who might wish to hear the word of God. Though most were out, and the doors barred. We would go on to discover that the whole town, it seemed, was occupied with the Christmas tchotchkes festival at the city's events center. A fact we discovered when stopping for coffee at the hotel next door.

On our rounds, we made a point to check on my parents who were doing much of nothing, as folk In their seventies are sometimes known to do. I encouraged my father to get out into the day in spite of his feeling tired. To walk in the leaves at least. And maybe brighten someone else's day in addition to his own.

Funeral Rites

About 11:30, we moved into funerary mode, and attended a memorial program for a longtime friend who passed way after falling in the bathtub and breaking his neck. It's never easy to experience that, but hardly survivable in our eighties. The function was well-supported and the program, while a tad wordy, was kind and honorable. No doubt, the family was greatly comforted by the showing and the words.

While the condition of the dead is as sleep, I am confident my friend would be proud of us all. We will not get over it, but as the speaker said, with God's help, we can get through it.

To the Theater

Heading out at 12:35, we drove to Seymour, a small town in West Texas. Our goal, a local theater production of Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott. We are both fans of the tale, and though must admit having only read portions of the book can at least claim valid fandom in the fact that I have visited Miss Alcott's home where the story was written. It was a cold, wet winter day when we experienced the author's abode, once adjacent to an orchard of some kind and filled with items of her storied life.

Since this was a tiny town, and the cast mostly very young, I wasn't sure what to expect when the curtain rose. However what we experienced for just over two hours was a delightful and earnest effort by the director and the actors. I was dismayed at Jo's appearance, simply because I have long been enamored with Winona Ryder as Jo March in the 1994 film adaptation. But the young woman playing Jo, Savannah Sturgeon, did a lovely job of embodying the wild personality brimming with joy, imagination, and love. She was bright and big and had the range to give us an enjoyable, convincing character.

The whole cast was, in fact thoroughly enjoyable and the script was clearly based on the book (which I have not read in it's entirety) and so BRAVO for memorizing so much material written in a voice rarely seen in modern works. They had worked very hard to meet a standard that was far beyond the small-town theater we visited.

Reese Warren's Amy March was another highlight. She has the natural rhythm and grace to truly engage the audience. I found her moments on stage to be particularly captivating.

Nathaniel Rogers' Professor Bhaer was hilarious with a big, and assuming, fake German accent. But he completely owned the role and played it straight which only made him more endearing. It was quite the opposite of what I love of Louis Garrel's performance in the earlier adaptation. But still VERY entertaining. Just different than I expected. I will assume Rogers' performance is closer to as written by Alcott.

While I won't go on to list the entire cast, I will say outstanding was Jeb Stacey's Laurie. Jeb is very clearly a cowboy. A good ol' boy and while his performance was strong and entertaining, his mannerisms tended to overwhelm what is to me, a refined, but inexperienced personality. Having said that, I LOVED Jeb. He is the spitting image/personality of a lifelong friend. Terse, loud and a bit stiff. Ray, I you're out there and you happen to read this, your doppelgänger lives in Seymour. Any love-children I do not know of?

I found several parts of the play quite moving: 1. Reading father's first letter/telegram to the girls. 2. Father's outpouring of love for the girls after coming home 3. Laurie's expression of love for Jo 4. Amy's burning of Jo's manuscript (this one always shocks me, but today, it drew tears)

It was a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon and I recommend you go see some local community theater. The smaller, the better. It promotes goodwill and it is a joy to see the production value of big budget stuff stripped away and just enjoy acting. Some good, some needing improving. But ALL entertainment!

The day was all lavender and each of us from the smallest to the star of the show were the flitting creatures, sucking up the nectar of life. Proving that even places like Dust Meridian can provide the sweet joy that we need to thrive.

Seymour Community Theater's Production of Little Women

Epilogue

Since one of my more heart-rending moments was the father's dotting on his daughters, I decided to re-read Chapter 22, and found that in fact this production is almost a 1:1.

As someone who struggles with self-esteem and self-worth, I found his attention to be just overwhelming. Parent's, your children 'know' you love them. But, take the time to tell them regularly, in detail. Not a throwaway I love you, but look for moments like Jo March's Father and genuinely tell them what you love about them. The goodwill you build in them will pay dividends throughout their life.

Wolfinwool · Little Women – Chp 22 – Pleasant Meadows

Little Women by Loiusa May Alcott – excerpt:

Chapter 22 – Pleasant Meadows

Like sunshine after a storm were the peaceful weeks which followed. The invalids improved rapidly, and Mr. March began to talk of returning early in the new year. Beth was soon able to lie on the study sofa all day, amusing herself with the well-beloved cats at first, and in time with doll’s sewing, which had fallen sadly behind-hand. Her once active limbs were so stiff and feeble that Jo took her for a daily airing about the house in her strong arms. Meg cheerfully blackened and burned her white hands cooking delicate messes for ‘the dear’, while Amy, a loyal slave of the ring, celebrated her return by giving away as many of her treasures as she could prevail on her sisters to accept.

As Christmas approached, the usual mysteries began to haunt the house, and Jo frequently convulsed the family by proposing utterly impossible or magnificently absurd ceremonies, in honor of this unusually merry Christmas. Laurie was equally impracticable, and would have had bonfires, skyrockets, and triumphal arches, if he had had his own way. After many skirmishes and snubbings, the ambitious pair were considered effectually quenched and went about with forlorn faces, which were rather belied by explosions of laughter when the two got together.

Several days of unusually mild weather fitly ushered in a splendid Christmas Day. Hannah ‘felt in her bones’ that it was going to be an unusually fine day, and she proved herself a true prophetess, for everybody and everything seemed bound to produce a grand success. To begin with, Mr. March wrote that he should soon be with them, then Beth felt uncommonly well that morning, and, being dressed in her mother’s gift, a soft crimson merino wrapper, was borne in high triumph to the window to behold the offering of Jo and Laurie. The Unquenchables had done their best to be worthy of the name, for like elves they had worked by night and conjured up a comical surprise. Out in the garden stood a stately snow maiden, crowned with holly, bearing a basket of fruit and flowers in one hand, a great roll of music in the other, a perfect rainbow of an Afghan round her chilly shoulders, and a Christmas carol issuing from her lips on a pink paper streamer.

THE JUNGFRAU TO BETH

God bless you, dear Queen Bess! May nothing you dismay, But health and peace and happiness Be yours, this Christmas day.

Here’s fruit to feed our busy bee, And flowers for her nose. Here’s music for her pianee, An afghan for her toes,

A portrait of Joanna, see, By Raphael No. 2, Who laboured with great industry To make it fair and true.

Accept a ribbon red, I beg, For Madam Purrer’s tail, And ice cream made by lovely Peg, A Mont Blanc in a pail.

Their dearest love my makers laid Within my breast of snow. Accept it, and the Alpine maid, From Laurie and from Jo.

How Beth laughed when she saw it, how Laurie ran up and down to bring in the gifts, and what ridiculous speeches Jo made as she presented them.

“I’m so full of happiness, that if Father was only here, I couldn’t hold one drop more,” said Beth, quite sighing with contentment as Jo carried her off to the study to rest after the excitement, and to refresh herself with some of the delicious grapes the ‘Jungfrau’ had sent her.

“So am I,” added Jo, slapping the pocket wherein reposed the long-desired Undine and Sintram.

“I’m sure I am,” echoed Amy, poring over the engraved copy of the Madonna and Child, which her mother had given her in a pretty frame.

“Of course I am!” cried Meg, smoothing the silvery folds of her first silk dress, for Mr. Laurence had insisted on giving it. “How can I be otherwise?” said Mrs. March gratefully, as her eyes went from her husband’s letter to Beth’s smiling face, and her hand caressed the brooch made of gray and golden, chestnut and dark brown hair, which the girls had just fastened on her breast.

Now and then, in this workaday world, things do happen in the delightful storybook fashion, and what a comfort it is. Half an hour after everyone had said they were so happy they could only hold one drop more, the drop came. Laurie opened the parlor door and popped his head in very quietly. He might just as well have turned a somersault and uttered an Indian war whoop, for his face was so full of suppressed excitement and his voice so treacherously joyful that everyone jumped up, though he only said, in a queer, breathless voice, “Here’s another Christmas present for the March family.”

Before the words were well out of his mouth, he was whisked away somehow, and in his place appeared a tall man, muffled up to the eyes, leaning on the arm of another tall man, who tried to say something and couldn’t. Of course there was a general stampede, and for several minutes everybody seemed to lose their wits, for the strangest things were done, and no one said a word.

Mr. March became invisible in the embrace of four pairs of loving arms. Jo disgraced herself by nearly fainting away, and had to be doctored by Laurie in the china closet. Mr. Brooke kissed Meg entirely by mistake, as he somewhat incoherently explained. And Amy, the dignified, tumbled over a stool, and never stopping to get up, hugged and cried over her father’s boots in the most touching manner. Mrs. March was the first to recover herself, and held up her hand with a warning, “Hush! Remember Beth.”

But it was too late. The study door flew open, the little red wrapper appeared on the threshold, joy put strength into the feeble limbs, and Beth ran straight into her father’s arms. Never mind what happened just after that, for the full hearts overflowed, washing away the bitterness of the past and leaving only the sweetness of the present.

It was not at all romantic, but a hearty laugh set everybody straight again, for Hannah was discovered behind the door, sobbing over the fat turkey, which she had forgotten to put down when she rushed up from the kitchen. As the laugh subsided, Mrs. March began to thank Mr. Brooke for his faithful care of her husband, at which Mr. Brooke suddenly remembered that Mr. March needed rest, and seizing Laurie, he precipitately retired. Then the two invalids were ordered to repose, which they did, by both sitting in one big chair and talking hard. Mr. March told how he had longed to surprise them, and how, when the fine weather came, he had been allowed by his doctor to take advantage of it, how devoted Brooke had been, and how he was altogether a most estimable and upright young man. Why Mr. March paused a minute just there, and after a glance at Meg, who was violently poking the fire, looked at his wife with an inquiring lift of the eyebrows, I leave you to imagine. Also why Mrs. March gently nodded her head and asked, rather abruptly, if he wouldn’t like to have something to eat. Jo saw and understood the look, and she stalked grimly away to get wine and beef tea, muttering to herself as she slammed the door, “I hate estimable young men with brown eyes!”

There never was such a Christmas dinner as they had that day. The fat turkey was a sight to behold, when Hannah sent him up, stuffed, browned, and decorated. So was the plum pudding, which melted in one’s mouth, likewise the jellies, in which Amy reveled like a fly in a honeypot. Everything turned out well, which was a mercy, Hannah said, “For my mind was that flustered, Mum, that it’s a merrycle I didn’t roast the pudding, and stuff the turkey with raisins, let alone bilin’ of it in a cloth.”

Mr. Laurence and his grandson dined with them, also Mr. Brooke, at whom Jo glowered darkly, to Laurie’s infinite amusement. Two easy chairs stood side by side at the head of the table, in which sat Beth and her father, feasting modestly on chicken and a little fruit. They drank healths, told stories, sang songs, ‘reminisced’, as the old folks say, and had a thoroughly good time. A sleigh ride had been planned, but the girls would not leave their father, so the guests departed early, and as twilight gathered, the happy family sat together round the fire.

“Just a year ago we were groaning over the dismal Christmas we expected to have. Do you remember?” asked Jo, breaking a short pause which had followed a long conversation about many things.

“Rather a pleasant year on the whole!” said Meg, smiling at the fire, and congratulating herself on having treated Mr. Brooke with dignity. “I think it’s been a pretty hard one,” observed Amy, watching the light shine on her ring with thoughtful eyes.

“I’m glad it’s over, because we’ve got you back,” whispered Beth, who sat on her father’s knee.

“Rather a rough road for you to travel, my little pilgrims, especially the latter part of it. But you have got on bravely, and I think the burdens are in a fair way to tumble off very soon,” said Mr. March, looking with fatherly satisfaction at the four young faces gathered round him.

“How do you know? Did Mother tell you?” asked Jo.

“Not much. Straws show which way the wind blows, and I’ve made several discoveries today.”

“Oh, tell us what they are!” cried Meg, who sat beside him.

“Here is one.” And taking up the hand which lay on the arm of his chair, he pointed to the roughened forefinger, a burn on the back, and two or three little hard spots on the palm. “I remember a time when this hand was white and smooth, and your first care was to keep it so. It was very pretty then, but to me it is much prettier now, for in this seeming blemishes I read a little history. A burnt offering has been made to vanity, this hardened palm has earned something better than blisters, and I’m sure the sewing done by these pricked fingers will last a long time, so much good will went into the stitches. Meg, my dear, I value the womanly skill which keeps home happy more than white hands or fashionable accomplishments. I’m proud to shake this good, industrious little hand, and hope I shall not soon be asked to give it away.”

If Meg had wanted a reward for hours of patient labor, she received it in the hearty pressure of her father’s hand and the approving smile he gave her. “What about Jo? Please say something nice, for she has tried so hard and been so very, very good to me,” said Beth in her father’s ear.

He laughed and looked across at the tall girl who sat opposite, with an unusually mild expression in her face.

“In spite of the curly crop, I don’t see the ‘son Jo’ whom I left a year ago,” said Mr. March. “I see a young lady who pins her collar straight, laces her boots neatly, and neither whistles, talks slang, nor lies on the rug as she used to do. Her face is rather thin and pale just now, with watching and anxiety, but I like to look at it, for it has grown gentler, and her voice is lower. She doesn’t bounce, but moves quietly, and takes care of a certain little person in a motherly way which delights me. I rather miss my wild girl, but if I get a strong, helpful, tenderhearted woman in her place, I shall feel quite satisfied. I don’t know whether the shearing sobered our black sheep, but I do know that in all Washington I couldn’t find anything beautiful enough to be bought with the five-and-twenty dollars my good girl sent me.”

Jo’s keen eyes were rather dim for a minute, and her thin face grew rosy in the firelight as she received her father’s praise, feeling that she did deserve a portion of it.

“Now, Beth,” said Amy, longing for her turn, but ready to wait.

“There’s so little of her, I’m afraid to say much, for fear she will slip away altogether, though she is not so shy as she used to be,” began their father cheerfully. But recollecting how nearly he had lost her, he held her close, saying tenderly, with her cheek against his own, “I’ve got you safe, my Beth, and I’ll keep you so, please God.”

After a minute’s silence, he looked down at Amy, who sat on the cricket at his feet, and said, with a caress of the shining hair...

“I observed that Amy took drumsticks at dinner, ran errands for her mother all the afternoon, gave Meg her place tonight, and has waited on every one with patience and good humor. I also observe that she does not fret much nor look in the glass, and has not even mentioned a very pretty ring which she wears, so I conclude that she has learned to think of other people more and of herself less, and has decided to try and mold her character as carefully as she molds her little clay figures. I am glad of this, for though I should be very proud of a graceful statue made by her, I shall be infinitely prouder of a lovable daughter with a talent for making life beautiful to herself and others.”

“What are you thinking of, Beth?” asked Jo, when Amy had thanked her father and told about her ring.

“I read in Pilgrim’s Progress today how, after many troubles, Christian and Hopeful came to a pleasant green meadow where lilies bloomed all year round, and there they rested happily, as we do now, before they went on to their journey’s end,” answered Beth, adding, as she slipped out of her father’s arms and went to the instrument, “It’s singing time now, and I want to be in my old place. I’ll try to sing the song of the shepherd boy which the Pilgrims heard. I made the music for Father, because he likes the verses.”

So, sitting at the dear little piano, Beth softly touched the keys, and in the sweet voice they had never thought to hear again, sang to her own accompaniment the quaint hymn, which was a singularly fitting song for her.

He that is down need fear no fall, He that is low no pride. He that is humble ever shall Have God to be his guide.

I am content with what I have, Little be it, or much. And, Lord! Contentment still I crave, Because Thou savest such.

Fulness to them a burden is, That go on pilgrimage. Here little, and hereafter bliss, Is best from age to age!

 
Read more... Discuss...

from John Karahalis

Some of the best healthcare is free: fresh air, sunshine, exercise, clean water, good sleep, meaningful relationships, and real foods from the Earth. (Well, whole foods like these are not free, but they're often less expensive than the big, bright, fantastical confections that dominate grocery store shelves.)

Of course, none of this is enough, or our ancestors would have lived much longer than they did. Vaccines, medicine, and medical treatments obviously extend life and improve outcomes in profound ways. But to a large extent, what we're lacking—what I'm lacking, at least—is not the big business of medical technology. It's healthier habits and deeper engagement with the real world.

I'm just beginning to really understand this, and I want to be better, so I'm writing this partly as a reminder to myself.

#Business #PersonalDevelopment #Philosophy #Technology #Wellbeing

 
Read more...

from Douglas Vandergraph

Humanity has always longed to understand how heaven reaches earth — how the unseen moves, protects, guides, heals, and strengthens ordinary people walking through extraordinary struggles. Across Jewish, Christian, and early church traditions, seven archangels stand as symbols of God’s heart. They are not objects of worship, but windows through which faith sees God’s courage, wisdom, healing, peace, mercy, and justice.

Before diving deeply into their meaning, take a moment to watch the powerful video that has helped thousands rediscover the truth about them: Seven Archangels — the phrase people search for most when exploring this topic.

This article unfolds all seven in rich, transformative detail:

  • Michael — Courage that defeats fear
  • Gabriel — God’s voice breaking into silence
  • Raphael — Healing for wounds and scars
  • Uriel — Light of wisdom guiding your steps
  • Raguel — Peace and reconciliation
  • Sariel — Obedience that brings freedom
  • Remiel — Mercy and hope for eternity

What follows is not a theological textbook. It is a spiritual journey. A deep, soul-level exploration of how each archangel points not to themselves, but to the living God who uses their stories to shape your own.

The Sacred Origin of the Seven

The seven archangels appear across several ancient writings:

  • The Book of Enoch describes seven holy ones who “stand in the presence of God.”
  • Early Christian commentators, including St. Ambrose and St. Gregory the Great, acknowledged multiple high-ranking messengers of God.
  • Scripture openly names Michael (Daniel 10, Jude 1:9, Revelation 12), Gabriel (Daniel 8–9, Luke 1), and Raphael (Tobit 3, 12).
  • Additional names — Uriel, Raguel, Sariel, Remiel — appear in early Jewish literature used by the church for centuries.

High-authority sources affirm these origins:

  • Britannica notes the significance of Michael and Gabriel as primary messengers of God.
  • The Jewish Encyclopedia documents Uriel, Raguel, Sariel, and Remiel in ancient Hebrew tradition.
  • Cambridge University Press publications on Second Temple Judaism reference the seven archangels extensively.

Across these writings, a pattern emerges: God uses messengers not to overshadow His glory, but to help people grasp it.

Each archangel embodies a dimension of God’s heart — courage, revelation, healing, wisdom, justice, obedience, mercy. These are not just theological ideas; they are living realities shaping your spiritual walk today.

Michael — The Flame of Courage That Defies Darkness

Michael is called the “Great Prince” and the protector of God’s people. Scripture paints him as the warrior who stands against the dragon, defends the faithful, and fights battles humans cannot see.

What Michael Means for You

Michael represents:

  • Courage when fear paralyzes your steps
  • Strength when your spirit feels overwhelmed
  • Protection against forces you cannot battle alone

Fear does not always roar. Sometimes it whispers: “You’re not enough.” “You’re alone.” “You can’t handle this.”

Michael is the heavenly reminder that such whispers are lies.

When you feel surrounded by uncertainty, remember the one who stands in Daniel 10, saying: “I have come because of your words.”

Your prayers are not empty echoes. They summon strength heaven has already prepared.

A Prayer for Michael’s Courage

Lord, when fear rises like a storm, let Your courage steady my soul. Guard my path, strengthen my steps, and let Your victory in Michael be the victory I walk in today.

Gabriel — The Voice of God Breaking Through Silence

Every major divine announcement in Scripture — the birth of John the Baptist, the conception of Jesus, the interpretation of Daniel’s visions — comes through Gabriel.

Silence is one of the hardest seasons for the human soul. It makes you wonder:

Is God ignoring me? Did I miss His voice? Will He ever speak again?

And then Gabriel enters Scripture with a message that resounds across centuries: “Do not fear. God has heard your prayer.”

What Gabriel Means for You

Gabriel represents:

  • Revelation when you feel directionless
  • Understanding when life stops making sense
  • Divine timing when nothing seems to move

Research from the Harvard Divinity School notes how Gabriel’s appearances throughout history symbolize clarity during chaos. He is the reminder that heaven still speaks — and heaven always speaks on time.

A Prayer for Gabriel’s Revelation

God, break through my silence. Where I am confused, speak truth. Where I am uncertain, speak direction. Let Your message come in Your perfect timing.

Raphael — The Healing Hand of God on Wounds Seen and Unseen

Raphael’s role in the Book of Tobit is profound:

  • He heals physical blindness
  • He restores a broken family
  • He protects from spiritual harm
  • He guides an uncertain traveler

Raphael’s very name means “God heals.”

What Raphael Means for You

Raphael represents:

  • Healing of physical sickness
  • Comfort for emotional wounds
  • Restoration for relationships fractured by time or pain
  • Recovery from memories that still grip the heart

Modern psychological studies show that spiritual hope significantly accelerates emotional healing. Combined with Raphael’s biblical role, that healing becomes even deeper.

A Prayer for Raphael’s Healing

Lord, touch my wounds — the ones no one sees and the ones I fear to speak. Heal what is broken, restore what is lost, and renew my heart through Your healing power.

Uriel — The Light of Wisdom That Illuminates Your Next Step

Uriel means “God is my light.” Early Christian writings describe him as the angel of wisdom, prophecy, intellectual clarity, and divine illumination.

Uriel does not simply shine light on what you already know. He reveals what you need to know — and protects you from what you are not yet ready to see.

What Uriel Means for You

Uriel represents:

  • Discernment when choices overwhelm you
  • Wisdom when you stand at a crossroads
  • Insight into spiritual truths you struggle to grasp
  • Clarity in moments of fog and confusion

Oxford University Press references Uriel extensively as the angel responsible for helping humans understand divine mysteries.

A Prayer for Uriel’s Wisdom

Lord, when I cannot see the path ahead, shine Your light. Give me wisdom that aligns with Your will and clarity that aligns with Your truth.

Raguel — The Peacemaker Who Restores What Life Has Broken

Raguel’s name means “Friend of God.” He is portrayed in ancient writings as the angel of justice, fairness, reconciliation, and restored relationships.

He is heaven’s reminder that peace is not passive — it is powerful.

What Raguel Means for You

Raguel represents:

  • Healing divisions between loved ones
  • Restoring justice where truth was distorted
  • Bringing unity into places of conflict
  • Ensuring what is broken does not stay broken

Conflict is exhausting. Arguments drain the spirit. Broken trust feels nearly impossible to mend.

But where humans give up, God begins. Raguel symbolizes that beginning.

A Prayer for Raguel’s Peace

Lord, mend what has been torn. Restore unity in my relationships. Bring fairness, justice, and peace where there has been confusion, tension, or pain.

Sariel — The Strength to Obey God Even When It Is Hard

Sariel’s ancient meanings include “Command of God” and “Prince of God.” His role in early Jewish texts centers on obedience, discipline, and alignment with God’s will.

Obedience is not punishment. It is protection.

What Sariel Means for You

Sariel represents:

  • Strength to choose what is right when temptation calls
  • Discipline that shapes the soul
  • Freedom found in aligning yourself with God’s ways
  • Courage to walk away from what God never intended

Many faith scholars note that free will becomes powerful only when surrendered to wisdom.

A Prayer for Sariel’s Strength

Lord, give me the strength to follow Your path. When my will rebels, soften it. When I hesitate, steady me. Help me obey with joy, not fear.

Remiel — The Whisper of Mercy and the Promise of Eternity

Remiel appears in several ancient writings as an angel of hope, resurrection, mercy, and the final gathering of God’s faithful.

If Michael is the courage to fight, Remiel is the comfort to finish.

What Remiel Means for You

Remiel represents:

  • Mercy when guilt weighs heavy
  • Hope when your future feels uncertain
  • Encouragement during seasons of grief
  • Assurance that God’s promises are eternal

Even academic discussions — such as those published by the Society of Biblical Literature — point to Remiel as a symbol of God’s promise that death is not the end.

A Prayer for Remiel’s Hope

Lord, lift my heart. When I feel hopeless, fill me with Your promise. When I am ashamed, wrap me in Your mercy. When I fear the future, remind me I am held by eternity.

The Seven Together: A Divine Portrait of God’s Heart

Individually, each archangel reveals a facet of God. Together, they form a breathtaking tapestry:

  • Michael — Courage
  • Gabriel — Revelation
  • Raphael — Healing
  • Uriel — Wisdom
  • Raguel — Peace
  • Sariel — Obedience
  • Remiel — Mercy

They reflect who God is — and who God calls you to become.

How to Walk With the Seven Archangels Daily

  • Morning focus: Choose one angel’s theme to guide your day.
  • Prayer journaling: Write how God is shaping you through that attribute.
  • Reflection: At night, ask: Where did I see God’s courage? God’s mercy? God’s wisdom today?
  • Conversation: Share insights with others — truth becomes stronger when spoken.

This is not angel-worship. This is God-worship through the virtues He reveals.

A Final Blessing for You

May Michael strengthen your courage. May Gabriel open your ears to God’s voice. May Raphael heal every wound. May Uriel shine light on your path. May Raguel restore what has been broken. May Sariel anchor your obedience. May Remiel fill your spirit with unshakable hope.

And may the God who commands angels command peace, wisdom, and blessing over your life.

With faith, purpose, and gratitude, Douglas Vandergraph

Watch Douglas Vandergraph’s inspiring faith-based videos on YouTube

Support my ministry via Buy Me a Coffee

#Archangels #Michael #Gabriel #Raphael #Uriel #Raguel #Sariel #Remiel #ChristianInspiration #FaithTalk #Healing #Mercy #GodsPresence #ChristianLiving #SpiritualGrowth #HopeInGod

 
Read more...

from Human in the Loop

Every morning across corporate offices worldwide, a familiar digital routine unfolds. Company email, check. Slack, check. Salesforce, check. And then, in separate browser windows that never appear in screen-sharing sessions, ChatGPT Plus launches. Thousands of employees are paying the £20 monthly subscription themselves. Their managers don't know. IT certainly doesn't know. But productivity metrics tell a different story.

This pattern represents a quiet revolution happening across the modern workplace. It's not a coordinated rebellion, but rather millions of individual decisions made by workers who've discovered that artificial intelligence can dramatically amplify their output. The numbers are staggering: 75% of knowledge workers now use AI tools at work, with 77% of employees pasting data into generative AI platforms. And here's the uncomfortable truth keeping chief information security officers awake at night: 82% of that activity comes from unmanaged accounts.

Welcome to the era of Shadow AI, where the productivity revolution and the security nightmare occupy the same space.

The Productivity Paradox

The case for employee-driven AI adoption isn't theoretical. It's measurably transforming how work gets done. Workers are 33% more productive in each hour they use generative AI, according to research from the Federal Reserve. Support agents handle 13.8% more enquiries per hour. Business professionals produce 59% more documents per hour. Programmers complete 126% more coding projects weekly.

These aren't marginal improvements. They're the kind of productivity leaps that historically required fundamental technological shifts: the personal computer, the internet, mobile devices. Except this time, the technology isn't being distributed through carefully managed IT programmes. It's being adopted through consumer accounts, personal credit cards, and a tacit understanding amongst employees that it's easier to ask forgiveness than permission.

“The worst possible thing would be one of our employees taking customer data and putting it into an AI engine that we don't manage,” says Sam Evans, chief information security officer at Clearwater Analytics, the investment management software company overseeing £8.8 trillion in assets. His concern isn't hypothetical. In 2023, Samsung engineers accidentally leaked sensitive source code and internal meeting notes into ChatGPT whilst trying to fix bugs and summarise documents. Apple responded to similar concerns by banning internal staff from using ChatGPT and GitHub Copilot in 2024, citing data exposure risks.

But here's where the paradox deepens. When Samsung discovered the breach, they didn't simply maintain the ban. After the initial lockdown, they began developing in-house AI tools, eventually creating their own generative AI model called Gauss and integrating AI into their products through partnerships with Google and NVIDIA. The message was clear: the problem wasn't AI itself, but uncontrolled AI.

The financial services sector demonstrates this tension acutely. Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase, and Bank of America have all implemented strict AI usage policies. Yet “implemented” doesn't mean “eliminated.” It means the usage has gone underground, beyond the visibility of IT monitoring tools that weren't designed to detect AI application programming interfaces. The productivity gains are too compelling for employees to ignore, even when policy explicitly prohibits usage.

The question facing organisations isn't whether AI will transform their workforce. That transformation is already happening, with or without official approval. The question is whether companies can create frameworks that capture the productivity gains whilst managing the risks, or whether the gap between corporate policy and employee reality will continue to widen.

The Security Calculus That Doesn't Add Up

The security concerns aren't hypothetical hand-wringing. They're backed by genuinely alarming statistics. Generative AI tools have become the leading channel for corporate-to-personal data exfiltration, responsible for 32% of all unauthorised data movement. And 27.4% of corporate data employees input into AI tools is classified as sensitive, up from 10.7% a year ago.

Break down that sensitive data, and the picture becomes even more concerning. Customer support interactions account for 16.3%, source code for 12.7%, research and development material for 10.8%, and unreleased marketing material for 6.6%. When Obsidian Security surveyed organisations, they found that over 50% have at least one shadow AI application running on their networks. These aren't edge cases. This is the new normal.

“When employees paste confidential meeting notes into an unvetted chatbot for summarisation, they may unintentionally hand over proprietary data to systems that could retain and reuse it, such as for training,” explains Anton Chuvakin, security adviser at Google Cloud's Office of the CISO. The risk isn't just about today's data breach. It's about permanently encoding your company's intellectual property into someone else's training data.

Yet here's what makes the security calculation so fiendishly difficult: the risks are probabilistic and diffuse, whilst the productivity gains are immediate and concrete. A marketing team that can generate campaign concepts 40% faster sees that value instantly. The risk that proprietary data might leak into an AI training set? That's a future threat with unclear probability and impact.

This temporal and perceptual asymmetry creates a perfect storm for shadow adoption. Employees see colleagues getting more done, faster. They see AI becoming fluent in tasks that used to consume hours. And they make the rational individual decision to start using these tools, even if it creates collective organisational risk. The benefit is personal and immediate. The risk is organisational and deferred.

“Management sees the productivity gains related to AI but doesn't necessarily see the associated risks,” one virtual CISO observed in a cybersecurity industry survey. This isn't a failure of leadership intelligence. It's a reflection of how difficult it is to quantify and communicate probabilistic risks that might materialise months or years after the initial exposure.

Consider the typical employee's perspective. If using ChatGPT to draft emails or summarise documents makes them 30% more efficient, that translates directly to better performance reviews, more completed projects, and reduced overtime. The chance that their specific usage causes a data breach? Statistically tiny. From their vantage point, the trade-off is obvious.

From the organisation's perspective, however, the mathematics shift dramatically. When 93% of employees input company data into unauthorised AI tools, with 32% sharing confidential client information and 37% exposing private internal data, the aggregate risk becomes substantial. It's not about one employee's usage. It's about thousands of daily interactions, any one of which could trigger regulatory violations, intellectual property theft, or competitive disadvantage.

This is the asymmetry that makes shadow AI so intractable. The people benefiting from the productivity gains aren't the same people bearing the security risks. And the timeline mismatch means decisions made today might not manifest consequences until quarters or years later, long after the employee who made the initial exposure has moved on.

The Literacy Gap That Changes Everything

Whilst security teams and employees wage this quiet battle over AI tool adoption, a more fundamental shift is occurring. AI literacy has become a baseline professional skill in a way that closely mirrors how computer literacy evolved from specialised knowledge to universal expectation.

The numbers tell the story. Generative AI adoption in the workplace skyrocketed from 22% in 2023 to 75% in 2024. But here's the more revealing statistic: 74% of workers say a lack of training is holding them back from effectively using AI. Nearly half want more formal training and believe it's the best way to boost adoption. They're not asking permission to use AI. They're asking to be taught how to use it better.

This represents a profound reversal of the traditional IT adoption model. For decades, companies would evaluate technology, purchase it, deploy it, and then train employees to use it. The process flowed downward from decision-makers to end users. With AI, the flow has inverted. Employees are developing proficiency at home, using consumer tools like ChatGPT, Midjourney, and Claude. They're learning prompt engineering through YouTube tutorials and Reddit threads. They're sharing tactics in Slack channels and Discord servers.

By the time they arrive at work, they already possess skills that their employers haven't yet figured out how to leverage. Research from IEEE shows that AI literacy encompasses four dimensions: technology-related capabilities, work-related capabilities, human-machine-related capabilities, and learning-related capabilities. Employees aren't just learning to use AI tools. They're developing an entirely new mode of work that treats AI as a collaborative partner rather than a static application.

The hiring market has responded faster than corporate policy. More than half of surveyed recruiters say they wouldn't hire someone without AI literacy skills, with demand increasing more than sixfold in the past year. IBM's 2024 Global AI Adoption Index found that 40% of workers will need new job skills within three years due to AI-driven changes.

This creates an uncomfortable reality for organisations trying to enforce restrictive AI policies. You're not just fighting against productivity gains. You're fighting against professional skill development. When employees use shadow AI tools, they're not only getting their current work done faster. They're building the capabilities that will define their future employability.

“AI has added a whole new domain to the already extensive list of things that CISOs have to worry about today,” notes Matt Hillary, CISO of Drata, a security and compliance automation platform. But the domain isn't just technical. It's cultural. The question isn't whether your workforce will become AI-literate. It's whether they'll develop that literacy within your organisational framework or outside it.

When employees learn AI capabilities through consumer tools, they develop expectations about what those tools should do and how they should work. Enterprise AI offerings that are clunkier, slower, or less capable face an uphill battle for adoption. Employees have a reference point, and it's ChatGPT, not your internal AI pilot programme.

The Governance Models That Actually Work

The tempting response to shadow AI is prohibition. Lock it down. Block the domains. Monitor the traffic. Enforce compliance through technical controls and policy consequences. This is the instinct of organisations that have spent decades building security frameworks designed to create perimeters around approved technology.

The problem is that prohibition doesn't actually work. “If you ban AI, you will have more shadow AI and it will be harder to control,” warns Anton Chuvakin from Google Cloud. Employees who believe AI tools are essential to their productivity will find ways around the restrictions. They'll use personal devices, cellular connections, and consumer VPNs. The technology moves underground, beyond visibility and governance.

The organisations finding success are pursuing a fundamentally different approach: managed enablement. Instead of asking “how do we prevent AI usage,” they're asking “how do we provide secure AI capabilities that meet employee needs?”

Consider how Microsoft's Power Platform evolved at Centrica, the British multinational energy company. The platform grew from 300 applications in 2019 to over 800 business solutions, supporting nearly 330 makers and 15,000 users across the company. This wasn't uncontrolled sprawl. It was managed growth, with a centre of excellence maintaining governance whilst enabling innovation. The model provides a template: create secure channels for innovation rather than leaving employees to find their own.

Salesforce has taken a similar path with its enterprise AI offerings. After implementing structured AI adoption across its software development lifecycle, the company saw team delivery output surge by 19% in just three months. The key wasn't forcing developers to abandon AI tools. It was providing AI capabilities within a governed framework that addressed security and compliance requirements.

The success stories share common elements. First, they acknowledge that employee demand for AI tools is legitimate and productivity-driven. Second, they provide alternatives that are genuinely competitive with consumer tools in capability and user experience. Third, they invest in education and enablement rather than relying solely on policy and restriction.

Stavanger Kommune in Norway worked with consulting firm Bouvet to build its own Azure data platform with comprehensive governance covering Power BI, Power Apps, Power Automate, and Azure OpenAI. DBS Bank in Singapore collaborated with the Monetary Authority to develop AI governance frameworks that delivered SGD £750 million in economic value in 2024, with projections exceeding SGD £1 billion by 2025.

These aren't small pilot projects. They're enterprise-wide transformations that treat AI governance as a business enabler rather than a business constraint. The governance frameworks aren't designed to say “no.” They're designed to say “yes, and here's how we'll do it safely.”

Sam Evans from Clearwater Analytics summarises the mindset shift: “This isn't just about blocking, it's about enablement. Bring solutions, not just problems. When I came to the board, I didn't just highlight the risks. I proposed a solution that balanced security with productivity.”

The alternative is what security professionals call the “visibility gap.” Whilst 91% of employees say their organisations use at least one AI technology, only 23% of companies feel prepared to manage AI governance, and just 20% have established actual governance strategies. The remaining 77% are essentially improvising, creating policy on the fly as problems emerge rather than proactively designing frameworks.

This reactive posture virtually guarantees that shadow AI will flourish. Employees move faster than policy committees. By the time an organisation has debated, drafted, and distributed an AI usage policy, the workforce has already moved on to the next generation of tools.

What separates successful AI governance from theatrical policy-making is speed and relevance. If your approval process for new AI tools takes three months, employees will route around it. If your approved tools lag behind consumer offerings, employees will use both: the approved tool for compliance theatre and the shadow tool for actual work.

The Asymmetry Problem That Won't Resolve Itself

Even the most sophisticated governance frameworks can't eliminate the fundamental tension at the heart of shadow AI: the asymmetry between measurable productivity gains and probabilistic security risks.

When Unifonic, a customer engagement platform, adopted Microsoft 365 Copilot, they reduced audit time by 85%, saved £250,000 in costs, and saved two hours per day on cybersecurity governance. Organisation-wide, Copilot reduced research, documentation, and summarisation time by up to 40%. These are concrete, immediate benefits that appear in quarterly metrics and individual performance reviews.

Contrast this with the risk profile. When data exposure occurs through shadow AI, what's the actual expected loss? The answer is maddeningly unclear. Some data exposures result in no consequence. Others trigger regulatory violations, intellectual property theft, or competitive disadvantage. The distribution is heavily skewed, with most incidents causing minimal harm and a small percentage causing catastrophic damage.

Brett Matthes, CISO for APAC at Coupang, the South Korean e-commerce giant, emphasises the stakes: “Any AI solution must be built on a bedrock of strong data security and privacy. Without this foundation, its intelligence is a vulnerability waiting to be exploited.” But convincing employees that this vulnerability justifies abandoning a tool that makes them 33% more productive requires a level of trust and organisational alignment that many companies simply don't possess.

The asymmetry extends beyond risk calculation to workload expectations. Research shows that 71% of full-time employees using AI report burnout, driven not by the technology itself but by increased workload expectations. The productivity gains from AI don't necessarily translate to reduced hours or stress. Instead, they often result in expanded scope and accelerated timelines. What looks like enhancement can feel like intensification.

This creates a perverse incentive structure. Employees adopt AI tools to remain competitive with peers who are already using them. Managers increase expectations based on the enhanced output they observe. The productivity gains get absorbed by expanding requirements rather than creating slack. And through it all, the security risks compound silently in the background.

Organisations find themselves caught in a ratchet effect. Once AI-enhanced productivity becomes the baseline, reverting becomes politically and practically difficult. You can't easily tell your workforce “we know you've been 30% more productive with AI, but now we need you to go back to the old way because of security concerns.” The productivity gains create their own momentum, independent of whether leadership endorses them.

The Professional Development Wild Card

The most disruptive aspect of shadow AI may not be the productivity impact or security risks. It's how AI literacy is becoming decoupled from organisational training and credentialing.

For most of professional history, career-critical skills were developed through formal channels: university degrees, professional certifications, corporate training programmes. You learned accounting through CPA certification. You learned project management through PMP courses. You learned software development through computer science degrees. The skills that mattered for your career came through validated, credentialed pathways.

AI literacy is developing through a completely different model. YouTube tutorials, ChatGPT experimentation, Reddit communities, Discord servers, and Twitter threads. The learning is social, iterative, and largely invisible to employers. When an employee becomes proficient at prompt engineering or learns to use AI for code generation, there's no certificate to display, no course completion to list on their CV, no formal recognition at all.

Yet these skills are becoming professionally decisive. Gallup found that 45% of employees say their productivity and efficiency have improved because of AI, with the same percentage of chief human resources officers reporting organisational efficiency improvements. The employees developing AI fluency are becoming more valuable whilst the organisations they work for struggle to assess what those capabilities mean.

This creates a fundamental question about workforce capability development. If employees are developing career-critical skills outside organisational frameworks, using tools that organisations haven't approved and may actively prohibit, who actually controls professional development?

The traditional answer would be “the organisation controls it through hiring, training, and promotion.” But that model assumes the organisation knows what skills matter and has mechanisms to develop them. With AI, neither assumption holds. The skills are evolving too rapidly for formal training programmes to keep pace. The tools are too numerous and specialised for IT departments to evaluate and approve. And the learning happens through experimentation and practice rather than formal instruction.

When IBM surveyed enterprises about AI adoption, they found that whilst 89% of business leaders are at least familiar with generative AI, only 68% of workers have reached this level. But that familiarity gap masks a deeper capability inversion. Leaders may understand AI conceptually, but many employees already possess practical fluency from consumer tool usage.

The hiring market has begun pricing this capability. Demand for AI literacy skills has increased more than sixfold in the past year, with more than half of recruiters saying they wouldn't hire candidates without these abilities. But where do candidates acquire these skills? Increasingly, not from their current employers.

This sets up a potential spiral. Organisations that prohibit or restrict AI tool usage may find their employees developing critical skills elsewhere, making those employees more attractive to competitors who embrace AI adoption. The restrictive policy becomes a retention risk. You're not just losing productivity to shadow AI. You're potentially losing talent to companies with more progressive AI policies.

When Policy Meets Reality

So what's the actual path forward? After analysing the research, examining case studies, and evaluating expert perspectives, a consensus framework is emerging. It's not about choosing between control and innovation. It's about building systems where control enables innovation.

First, accept that prohibition fails. The data is unambiguous. When organisations ban AI tools, usage doesn't drop to zero. It goes underground, beyond the visibility of monitoring systems. Chuvakin's warning bears repeating: “If you ban AI, you will have more shadow AI and it will be harder to control.” The goal isn't elimination. It's channelling.

Second, provide legitimate alternatives that actually compete with consumer tools. This is where many enterprise AI initiatives stumble. They roll out AI capabilities that are technically secure but practically unusable, with interfaces that require extensive training, workflows that add friction, and capabilities that lag behind consumer offerings. Employees compare the approved tool to ChatGPT and choose shadow AI.

The successful examples share a common trait. The tools are genuinely good. Microsoft's Copilot deployment at Noventiq saved 989 hours on routine tasks within four weeks. Unifonic's implementation reduced audit time by 85%. These tools make work easier, not harder. They integrate with existing workflows rather than requiring new ones.

Third, invest in education as much as enforcement. Nearly half of employees say they want more formal AI training. This isn't resistance to AI. It's recognition that most people are self-taught and unsure whether they're using these tools effectively. Organisations that provide structured AI literacy programmes aren't just reducing security risks. They're accelerating productivity gains by moving employees from tentative experimentation to confident deployment.

Fourth, build governance frameworks that scale. The NIST AI Risk Management Framework and ISO 42001 standards provide blueprints. But the key is making governance continuous rather than episodic. Data loss prevention tools that can detect sensitive data flowing to AI endpoints. Regular audits of AI tool usage. Clear policies about what data can and cannot be shared with AI systems. And mechanisms for rapidly evaluating and approving new tools as they emerge.

NTT DATA's implementation of Salesforce's Agentforce demonstrates comprehensive governance. They built centralised management capabilities to ensure consistency and control across deployed agents, completed 3,500+ successful Salesforce projects, and maintain 10,000+ certifications. The governance isn't a gate that slows deployment. It's a framework that enables confident scaling.

Fifth, acknowledge the asymmetry and make explicit trade-offs. Organisations need to move beyond “AI is risky” and “AI is productive” to specific statements like “for customer support data, we accept the productivity gains of AI-assisted response drafting despite quantified risks, but for source code, the risk is unacceptable regardless of productivity benefits.”

This requires quantifying both sides of the equation. What's the actual productivity gain from AI in different contexts? What's the actual risk exposure? What controls reduce that risk, and what do those controls cost in terms of usability? Few organisations have done this analysis rigorously. Most are operating on intuition and anecdote.

The Cultural Reckoning

Beneath all the technical and policy questions lies a more fundamental cultural shift. For decades, corporate IT operated on a model of centralised evaluation, procurement, and deployment. End users consumed technology that had been vetted, purchased, and configured by experts. This model worked when technology choices were discrete, expensive, and relatively stable.

AI tools are none of those things. They're continuous, cheap (often free), and evolving weekly. The old model can't keep pace. By the time an organisation completes a formal evaluation of a tool, three newer alternatives have emerged.

This isn't just a technology challenge. It's a trust challenge. Shadow AI flourishes when employees believe their organisations can't or won't provide the tools they need to be effective. It recedes when organisations demonstrate that they can move quickly, evaluate fairly, and enable innovation within secure boundaries.

Sam Evans articulates the required mindset: “Bring solutions, not just problems.” Security teams that only articulate risks without proposing paths forward train their organisations to route around them. Security teams that partner with business units to identify needs and deliver secure capabilities become enablers rather than obstacles.

The research is clear: organisations with advanced governance structures including real-time monitoring and oversight committees are 34% more likely to see improvements in revenue growth and 65% more likely to realise cost savings. Good governance doesn't slow down AI adoption. It accelerates it by building confidence that innovation won't create catastrophic risk.

But here's the uncomfortable truth: only 18% of companies have established formal AI governance structures that apply to the whole company. The other 82% are improvising, creating policy reactively as issues emerge. In that environment, shadow AI isn't just likely. It's inevitable.

The cultural shift required isn't about becoming more permissive or more restrictive. It's about becoming more responsive. The organisations that will thrive in the AI era are those that can evaluate new tools in weeks rather than quarters, that can update policies as capabilities evolve, and that can provide employees with secure alternatives before shadow usage becomes entrenched.

The Question That Remains

After examining the productivity data, the security risks, the governance models, and the cultural dynamics, we're left with the question organisations can't avoid: If AI literacy and tool adaptation are now baseline professional skills that employees develop independently, should policy resist this trend or accelerate it?

The data suggests that resistance is futile and acceleration is dangerous, but managed evolution is possible. The organisations achieving results—Samsung building Gauss after the ChatGPT breach, DBS Bank delivering £750 million in value through governed AI adoption, Microsoft's customers seeing 40% time reductions—aren't choosing between control and innovation. They're building systems where control enables innovation.

This requires accepting several uncomfortable realities. First, that your employees are already using AI tools, regardless of policy. Second, that those tools genuinely do make them more productive. Third, that the productivity gains come with real security risks. Fourth, that prohibition doesn't eliminate the risks, it just makes them invisible. And fifth, that building better alternatives is harder than writing restrictive policies.

The asymmetry between productivity and risk won't resolve itself. The tools will keep getting better, the adoption will keep accelerating, and the potential consequences of data exposure will keep compounding. Waiting for clarity that won't arrive serves no one.

What will happen instead is that organisations will segment into two groups: those that treat employee AI adoption as a threat to be contained, and those that treat it as a capability to be harnessed. The first group will watch talent flow to the second. The second group will discover that competitive advantage increasingly comes from how effectively you can deploy AI across your workforce, not just in your products.

The workforce using AI tools in separate browser windows aren't rebels or security threats. They're the leading edge of a transformation in how work gets done. The question isn't whether that transformation continues. It's whether it happens within organisational frameworks that manage the risks or outside those frameworks where the risks compound invisibly.

There's no perfect answer. But there is a choice. And every day that organisations defer that choice, their employees are making it for them. The invisible workforce is already here, operating in browser tabs that never appear in screen shares, using tools that never show up in IT asset inventories, developing skills that never make it onto corporate training rosters.

The only question is whether organisations will acknowledge this reality and build governance around it, or whether they'll continue pretending that policy documents can stop a transformation that's already well underway. Shadow AI isn't coming. It's arrived. What happens next depends on whether companies treat it as a problem to eliminate or a force to channel.

Sources and References

  1. IBM. (2024). “What Is Shadow AI?” IBM Think Topics. https://www.ibm.com/think/topics/shadow-ai

  2. ISACA. (2025). “The Rise of Shadow AI: Auditing Unauthorized AI Tools in the Enterprise.” Industry News 2025. https://www.isaca.org/resources/news-and-trends/industry-news/2025/the-rise-of-shadow-ai-auditing-unauthorized-ai-tools-in-the-enterprise

  3. Infosecurity Magazine. (2024). “One In Four Employees Use Unapproved AI Tools, Research Finds.” https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/shadow-ai-employees-use-unapproved

  4. Varonis. (2024). “Hidden Risks of Shadow AI.” https://www.varonis.com/blog/shadow-ai

  5. TechTarget. (2025). “Shadow AI: How CISOs can regain control in 2025 and beyond.” https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/tip/Shadow-AI-How-CISOs-can-regain-control-in-2026

  6. St. Louis Federal Reserve. (2025). “The Impact of Generative AI on Work Productivity.” On the Economy, February 2025. https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2025/feb/impact-generative-ai-work-productivity

  7. Federal Reserve. (2024). “Measuring AI Uptake in the Workplace.” FEDS Notes, February 5, 2024. https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/measuring-ai-uptake-in-the-workplace-20240205.html

  8. Nielsen Norman Group. (2024). “AI Improves Employee Productivity by 66%.” https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ai-tools-productivity-gains/

  9. IBM. (2024). “IBM 2024 Global AI Adoption Index.” IBM Newsroom, October 28, 2024. https://newsroom.ibm.com/2025-10-28-Two-thirds-of-surveyed-enterprises-in-EMEA-report-significant-productivity-gains-from-AI,-finds-new-IBM-study

  10. McKinsey & Company. (2024). “The state of AI: How organizations are rewiring to capture value.” QuantumBlack Insights. https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/quantumblack/our-insights/the-state-of-ai

  11. Gallup. (2024). “AI Use at Work Has Nearly Doubled in Two Years.” Workplace Analytics. https://www.gallup.com/workplace/691643/work-nearly-doubled-two-years.aspx

  12. Salesforce. (2024). “How AI Literacy Builds a Future-Ready Workforce — and What Agentforce Taught Us.” Salesforce Blog. https://www.salesforce.com/blog/ai-literacy-builds-future-ready-workforce/

  13. Salesforce Engineering. (2024). “Building Sustainable Enterprise AI Adoption.” https://engineering.salesforce.com/building-sustainable-enterprise-ai-adoption-cultural-strategies-that-achieved-95-developer-engagement/

  14. World Economic Forum. (2025). “AI is shifting the workplace skillset. But human skills still count.” January 2025. https://www.weforum.org/stories/2025/01/ai-workplace-skills/

  15. IEEE Xplore. (2022). “Explicating AI Literacy of Employees at Digital Workplaces.” https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9681321/

  16. Google Cloud Blog. (2024). “Cloud CISO Perspectives: APAC security leaders speak out on AI.” https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/identity-security/cloud-ciso-perspectives-apac-security-leaders-speak-out-on-ai

  17. VentureBeat. (2024). “CISO dodges bullet protecting $8.8 trillion from shadow AI.” https://venturebeat.com/security/ciso-dodges-bullet-protecting-8-8-trillion-from-shadow-ai

  18. Obsidian Security. (2024). “Why Shadow AI and Unauthorized GenAI Tools Are a Growing Security Risk.” https://www.obsidiansecurity.com/blog/why-are-unauthorized-genai-apps-risky

  19. Cyberhaven. (2024). “Managing shadow AI: best practices for enterprise security.” https://www.cyberhaven.com/blog/managing-shadow-ai-best-practices-for-enterprise-security

  20. The Hacker News. (2025). “New Research: AI Is Already the #1 Data Exfiltration Channel in the Enterprise.” October 2025. https://thehackernews.com/2025/10/new-research-ai-is-already-1-data.html

  21. Kiteworks. (2024). “93% of Employees Share Confidential Data With Unauthorized AI Tools.” https://www.kiteworks.com/cybersecurity-risk-management/employees-sharing-confidential-data-unauthorized-ai-tools/

  22. Microsoft. (2024). “Building a foundation for AI success: Governance.” Microsoft Cloud Blog, March 28, 2024. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-cloud/blog/2024/03/28/building-a-foundation-for-ai-success-governance/

  23. Microsoft. (2025). “AI-powered success—with more than 1,000 stories of customer transformation and innovation.” Microsoft Cloud Blog, July 24, 2025. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-cloud/blog/2025/07/24/ai-powered-success-with-1000-stories-of-customer-transformation-and-innovation/

  24. Deloitte. (2024). “State of Generative AI in the Enterprise 2024.” https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/what-we-do/capabilities/applied-artificial-intelligence/content/state-of-generative-ai-in-enterprise.html

  25. NIST. (2024). “AI Risk Management Framework (AI RMF).” National Institute of Standards and Technology.

  26. InfoWorld. (2024). “Boring governance is the path to real AI adoption.” https://www.infoworld.com/article/4082782/boring-governance-is-the-path-to-real-ai-adoption.html

Tim Green

Tim Green UK-based Systems Theorist & Independent Technology Writer

Tim explores the intersections of artificial intelligence, decentralised cognition, and posthuman ethics. His work, published at smarterarticles.co.uk, challenges dominant narratives of technological progress while proposing interdisciplinary frameworks for collective intelligence and digital stewardship.

His writing has been featured on Ground News and shared by independent researchers across both academic and technological communities.

ORCID: 0009-0002-0156-9795 Email: tim@smarterarticles.co.uk

 
Read more... Discuss...

from POTUSRoaster

Hello again. I hope you are enjoying the weekend

POTUS has insured that you will never see the Epstein files. He has ordered his lap dog attorney general to start investigating members of his opposition party to determine any connections to the pedophile, like connections which POTUS obviously has had.

There is a very good reason for this action. If the Justice Department starts investigating people other than POTUS, all those files must be kept secret. That means any indication that POTUS might be involved will also be kept secret. The perfect action to prevent any legal action against POTUS, and only POTUS could do it.

This is the man with dozens of convictions for business fraud and for rape. Not exactly the sterling person we should have in that office. Let us hope that the mid-terms will bring into congress enough people with courage to put this felon in the place where he belongs – prison.

POTUS Roaster

Thanks for reading my posts. If you want to see the rest of them, please go to write.as/potusroaster/archive/

To email us send it too potusroaster@gmail.com

Please tell your family, friends and neighbors about the posts.

 
Read more... Discuss...

from The Beacon Press

A Fault Line Investigation — Published by The Beacon Press
Published: November 15, 2025
https://thebeaconpress.org/the-epstein-files-congressional-push-state-level-predator-hunts-and-the

Executive Breath

The Epstein client list remains sealed, but 2025 congressional pressure — led by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) and Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) — has forced a December 31, 2025 deadline for DOJ release of 2008 Florida grand jury materials (Section 712, CR November 13). Meanwhile, 38 states have active child trafficking task forces (DOJ 2025), with 1,200+ arrests since 2023.

The truth under scrutiny: While politicians “demand transparency,” no federal client list vote has passed, and citizens are left with legal tools — FOIA, state AG petitions, and victim funds — to investigate predators locally.

The Congressional Push: Discharge Petition and GOP Resistance

The discharge petition for H.Res. 577 – introduced July 2025 by Massie and Khanna – requires the DOJ to release all Epstein/Maxwell records, including communications and the so-called “client list”. It secured the 218th signature on November 12 when Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) was sworn in, forcing a floor vote next week despite Speaker Mike Johnson's opposition. Key developments:
– July 15 Rules Committee Vote: 7 Republicans (including Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, R-NC) blocked the measure, despite MAGA calls for release.
– September 3 Press Conference: Khanna and Massie rallied survivors, promising “every damn name”.
– November 12: Grijalva's signature clinched it, with 4 Republicans (Massie, Boebert, Mace, Greene) joining all 214 Democrats. Trump's reported pressure on Boebert and Mace failed.

The bill has no Senate counterpart, but Sen. John Thune (R-SD) noted “little desire” for action. No vote on the full client list has occurred; Section 712 (CR November 13) only covers Florida grand jury materials.

State-Level Predator Hunts: Task Forces and Arrests

38 states have dedicated child trafficking task forces (DOJ 2025), focusing on local networks amid federal delays. Key 2025 actions:
– Florida: State AG Ashley Moody's task force led 150 arrests (2025), targeting Epstein-linked rings.
– California: LA County task force recovered 200 minors, arrested 300 traffickers.
– Texas: Operation Lone Star seized $2.5M in assets, 400 arrests.
– National: 1,200+ arrests since 2023 (FBI IC3 2025), but only 10% federal prosecutions.

The truth under scrutiny: State efforts fill federal gaps, but without the Epstein files, high-profile networks remain untouched.

Citizens can pursue justice via:
– FOIA Requests: Demand DOJ records (21 CFR § 20).
– State AG Petitions: File with AGs for local investigations (e.g., Florida's Moody).
– Victim Funds: Support NCMEC (National Center for Missing & Exploited Children) or Polaris Project.
– Whistleblower Tips: Submit to FBI IC3.

The truth under scrutiny: These tools empower individuals, but systemic release (like H.Res. 577) requires congressional will.

Rider: The Highest Wrong

Child trafficking is the absolute inversion of the human covenant.

Dimension What It Violates Ring
Human Nature Innocence as sacred The child is the tabula rasa — to exploit is to erase the future.
Human Society Trust as foundation Society survives on the contract: adults protect the defenseless. Trafficking shatters it.
Human Laws Justice as covenant Laws ring the scar — when they shield predators, they become the cage.
Human Justice Truth as the ring Justice is restoration of the child’s breath — not punishment, not politics.

No child is property. No power justifies silence.

Sources (Full Attribution — Pillar 3: Truth Only)

  1. Massie-Khanna Epstein Petition Hits 218 Signatures, Forcing Floor Vote – Politico, July 15, 2025
  2. House Rules Committee Blocks Epstein Files Release – Newsweek, July 15, 2025
  3. DOJ Child Trafficking Task Force Report 2025 – U.S. Department of Justice, November 2025
  4. Section 712, Continuing Resolution, November 13, 2025 – U.S. Congress

Action Demand (Pillar 7)

File FOIA for Epstein grand jury materials — demand redacted release.
→ FOIA.gov
→ Reference: Section 712, CR November 13, 2025

Support The Beacon's Breath

Light on the fracture. No paywall. No ads. Truth only.
The Beacon Press | thebeaconpress.org

 
Read more...

from Dallineation

I had already been leaning towards simplifying my physical media collecting by ditching vinyl records, but a video with some startling information gave me the push I needed.

Vinyl is Toxic

I knew vinyl should be kept out of landfills – that's one reason I justified collecting it. But after recently discovering a video by Ben Jordan from six years ago, I learned how toxic vinyl is to the air you breathe and how, with a few exceptions, the modern vinyl industry makes records pretty much the same way they have always been made.

You can watch the video on PeerTube or YouTube.

There is a lot of good info in the video, like what exactly vinyl is and why the vinyl in records is toxic. But the part of the video that really sealed the deal for me was when he got an industrial air quality monitor and stuck it next to a turntable. It showed that alarming levels of toxic particulates and gasses are released by vinyl records when they are played or even just handled.

It may just be a coincidence, but my allergies have been getting worse over the last two years, and wouldn't you know it, I started collecting vinyl records two years ago. At the very least, it's not helping. But this is just one of a few reasons I made this decision.

Vinyl is Expensive

Out of vinyl, compact discs, and cassette tapes, vinyl is the most expensive format. Of course it depends on the title. I've seen some rare CDs that are going for hundreds of dollars. But I've seen rare vinyl going for thousands.

New vinyl goes for $30-$50+ while new CDs go for around $15-$20. For the sake of my wallet, I'm focusing on CDs and tapes from now on.

Vinyl is Big

It takes up a lot of space and it's heavy. I can store 50-60 vinyl record albums in an IKEA Kallax shelf cube. But I can fit 120+ CD album jewel cases in the same space. By collecting CDs and tapes I can essentially double the amount of music I can store in my limited space.

Vinyl is Great and I'll Miss It

Despite all of this, it's difficult to give it up. I love each physical format for its unique quirks. Vinyl provides a delightful, intentional listening experience. Digging crates, and spinning and flipping records is something I will miss. But CDs have always been my favorite physical format for music and it just makes sense for me to focus on that again.

And so I've been sending vinyl mailers to my vinyl streaming friends on Twitch. I've also been taking stacks of 20 records at a time to trade in for store credit at my favorite record store and taking home twice as many CDs. It'll take a while to get rid of them, but I think it's a move that makes sense for me.

#100DaysToOffload (No. 104) #retro #physicalMedia #music #hobbies

 
Read more... Discuss...

from Roscoe's Story

In Summary: * A pretty good Saturday. College football in the afternoon, delicious home-cooked food, a Christopher Lee Dracula movie on the Saturday night Svengoolie. Yes! My kind of Saturday!

Prayers, etc.: * My daily prayers.

Health Metrics: * bw= 218.26 * bp= 148/91 (66)

Exercise: * kegel pelvic floor exercise, half squats, calf raises, wall push-ups

Diet: * 07:20 – 2 crispy oatmeal cookies * 09:30 – 1 ham and cheese sandwich * 10:30 – 1 peanut butter sandwich * 12:00 – 3 boiled eggs * 13:20 – 1 fresh apple * 15:30 – steak and onions, white rice * 17:50 – sweet rice with brown sugar

Activities, Chores, etc.: * 07:00 – bank accounts activity monitored * 07:45 – read, pray, listen to news reports from various sources * 10:00 – listening to the Flagship Station for IU Sports ahead of today's early game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Indiana Hoosiers) * 14:40 – after the convincing IU win, now following the UCF vs. Texas Tech football game * 17:45 – listen to news reports from various sources * 19:00 – Svengoolie

Chess: * 11:10 – moved in all pending games

 
Read more...

from Les mots de la fin

Plusieurs lectures en cours : Le liseur de Bernhard Schlink, le huitième tome de La roue du temps de Robert Jordan, Biographie de la faim d'Amélie Nothomb, et un ouvrage sur l'hindouisme par Bernard Baudoin. La lecture occupe une place centrale dans ma vie, c'est évident. Je ne saurais l'imaginer sans lecture. D'ailleurs, je n'ai jamais oublié mon passage à Nairobi (Kenya) en février 1990 alors que je n'avais plus de livre à lire… Comme j'étais malheureux ! J'ai parcouru les rues de la ville à la recherche d'une librairie susceptible de vendre des livres en français, mais en vain... Le lendemain, j'ai dû faire un interminable trajet en avion – plus de quinze heures de vol avec des arrêts dans plusieurs aéroports africains, si ma mémoire est bonne – sans rien à me mettre sous les yeux… Aussitôt arrivé à Abidjan, je me suis précipité dans une librairie pour me procurer deux ou trois ouvrages, de gros livres de la collection Bouquins chez Robert Laffont. J'avais une telle soif de me replonger dans la lecture… Il est clair que je ne pourrais pas vivre sans lire. Et je ne comprends pas les gens qui ne lisent pas. Quelle tristesse… Mais peut-être qu'eux-mêmes me jugent triste aussi, justement parce que je passe plusieurs heures par jour, assis dans un fauteuil avec un livre ou une liseuse à la main. Peut-être trouvent-ils que ma vie est sans intérêt, que ma vie est plate… Plus jeune, je me souviens d'une amie qui ne cessait de me dire que je passais à côté de ma vie, que j'avais toujours l'esprit dans d'autres mondes, dans des espaces temporels qui n'ont rien à voir par ce qui se passe “ici et maintenant”. Je répondais toujours, en cela très proustien, qu'il valait mieux rêver sa vie que de la vivre… Avait-elle tort, mon amie, de me reprocher mon apparente inactivité ? Des dizaines d'années plus tard, je crois que sincèrement que oui, car la lecture m'a fait découvrir des mondes dont elle ne soupçonne même pas l'existence. Dans ma vie oisive, je suis allé à Moscou en 1880, en Corée en 1951, au Japon en 1682, en France dans les années les plus créatrices de la société occidentale, soit entre 1871 et 1914. Où est-elle allée, elle ? En Floride ? À Cuba ? J'y suis allé bien avant la Révolution de Fidel Castro…

Mais ceux et celles qui n'aiment pas lire ont leur raison. Après tout, tout se justifie, le meilleur comme le pire. Qui sommes-nous pour se juger les uns les autres ? Une personne qui passe plusieurs heures par jour à façonner des objets décoratifs est-elle moins importante, moins intéressante, voire moins humaine, qu'un grand lecteur ? Comme il est difficile d'affirmer certaines choses sur un ton péremptoire, d'afficher des convictions solides envers et contre tous ! Pourquoi suis-je toujours animé par le doute ? Je suis un homme de sable, on me l'a déjà dit, et cette fois avec raison.

J'aime lire, donc. Que ceux et celles qui ne s'adonnent pas à la lecture puissent trouver leur équilibre.

Daniel Ducharme : 2025-11-14 Catégorie : Existence Mots-clés : #lecture #littérature #modedevie

 
Lire la suite... Discuss...

Join the writers on Write.as.

Start writing or create a blog