Posts by cyber7

Guy rejects top photo prize after revealing snap was actually made using AI

Re: C2PA

How nice. I can then take a digitally signed picture of my projected screen showing my nifty iterative AI artwork.

Texas cops sue Tesla claiming 'systematic fraud' in Autopilot after Model X ploughed into two parked police cars

...drunks and flashing lights

There's established evidence that drunks are drawn to flashing lights. So, on the one hand, the driver may have a predisposition based on his inebriated disposition, to 'go towards the lights'. On the other, the Tesla is apparently blinded by the lights. Frankly, I've been blinded by those damn new LED lights police cars now favor at night, so I can sympathize with the autopilot.

Re: Giving up the booze.

2 drinks = .08 BAC at 100Lbs body weight, if slammed down at once...It's significantly less for a guy say, 200Lbs and drinking over 1hr or two. #'s also depend of the qty of alcohol per drink. Shame on you for oversimplifying the facts.

Revealed: The secret CEO texts that tell the tale of Uber-Waymo's self-driving tech spat

Re: One sided text conversations

I suggest you RTFM or Google "Automatically Delete iPhone Messages After 30 Days". Messages received are deleted after 30days. That other people received his text messages is precisely why investigators have a one sided conversation.

Girls outpace boys in US IT and engineering test

No Hands on Assistance = No Interest?

"The results would appear to counter the notion that female students lack the interest or ability to pursue STEM training, at least at the grade-school level."

I've looked over the NAEP data with their TEL profile tool, and can see no way to correlate "interest" with "ability". Clearly women are quite capable, but this test says little to nothing about female interest in Tech/Engr. One interesting bit: while most points are but a few point off from sex 2 sex, one question was 14 points in favor of males - "Definitely can use tools/materials to fix something".

This metric I can easily believe, given that most fathers have generally favored giving sons hands on experience with tools from a very early age. Computers are tools; take my misspent youth modding Commodore 64's with fellow male peers, most lamenting the lack of female presence capable of even turning a screwdriver. The few women in tech I've met in 25 years, have attributed their interest to early and continued exposure to tools and early instruction from their caregivers. Jeri Elsworth begged her father to have the C64 originally purchased for her brother; her father encouraged her to tinker with car parts he brought home. Other times, its pressure from that EE/ME/tech parent like Marissa Meyer.

I personally was hit with both: a father (electrical engineer) who taught me to use a soldering iron at age 6 (lest I burn down the house), gave me free range to his personal library, and allowed me use to tools in his wood working shed (provided I ask AND put them back when finished). I've now a young daughter myself not quite a teen, and while she prefers her stuffed animals and dolls, I try to give her opportunities with a socket wrench, drill, soldering iron, o-scope (with supervision, of course, even if my wife still worries). It's about familiarity & building confidence; without it there can be little potential interest in the future, even if otherwise fully capable in math/science/engineering.

EU mulls €3bn fine for Google

Re: Not sure on the level of the fine but...

And if Google placed icon links to Bing, Yahoo, etc on their main page under the banner "Alternative Search Sources", would it placate the competitors? Would highlighting all "paid" results placate the masses? Frankly anyone who thinks the results from any engine is "neutral" still thinks AOL is the Internet. How many of us would pay hard $ for a search filter removing all "paid" results and undue influence?

All about self promotion

"Google’s search results page is both a “neutral” platform and a shop-window for its own services."

Neutral?!? Who can claim this with a straight face? Everything is slanted, optimized and filtered to the benefit of the search provider. Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc...they all do so. Ask yourself, why is it that when troubleshooting any Microsoft product, you use Google instead of Bing if you expect the the quickest path to a solution. Ask yourself why, if you are searching for pr0n imagery with all fitlering allegedly disabled, you favor Bing images instead of Google Images. Ask yourself why you closed that Yahoo Movie search and opted for Google's Movie search....was it the endless display of click bait ads?

They all monkey with the results to get your attention and maximize their revenue. Why do most of us keep going back to the Alphabet soup?

French duck-crushing device sells for €40k

Crushing

It's a good thing the final scene of "I Spit on Your Grave 2" wasn't filmed in France.

Label your cables: A cautionary tale from the server room

You know that camera on your phone...

It's your friend. Use it; click every angle - Before you pull those cables; before you pull that module or card; before you take it apart.

The grey hairs you save may be your own.

Putin's internet guru says 'nyet' to Windows, 'da' to desktop Linux

Re: Next....

Funny..I've heard this is the year of the Linux desktop for the last ten years. 17 Mints later and it's still the year of the rat.

Louisville says yes to Google Fiber. Funny story: AT&T, TWC didn't want that to happen

Is our equipment in your back yard?

Considering Comcast/TW use subcontractors that still don't have a clue where their equipment is every time they visit, I wouldn't stand too tall claiming to be concerned about their cabling. Especially considering they do such a cra ptastic job at burying their home bound cables. Then again, maybe they know precisely what level of monkeys they have working for them, and have a valid concern...

'Fry-OS 8' iPhone BLEW UP MY PANTS wails roasted Johnson

Re: Lawyer with morals!

"...and prevent it from happening ever again," he said.

From an engineering stand point this NOT possible. There is always a very small chance of something unforeseeable occurring. Even if current interrupt devices were added to the LIPO pack design.

From a user standpoint it is quite preventable. Do not put a device in body orifices, or difficult to access pockets that is subject to physical abuse, which contains an energy device known to fail under shock, & punctures which delaminate the energy cell, not to mention catastrophic failure when short circuited, particularly by fluids.

Re: Not a 5C in the picture

I don't think so. The 5C anodized black edge is chamfered. However, I'd bet $ that he dropped it along with his keys.

You really don't want to abuse these batteries. A guy fell off a cart and bent his iPhone 6, with very similar results. Google "iPhone-6-user-left-second-degree-burns-new-device-bent-burst-flames"

Lithium-ion Batteries can & WILL become volatile in extreme conditions

I bet you money he didn't just drop his keys, but the phone too...and put it in his pocket after fetching it. The Li-ion batteries can be sensitive to shock.

Google : "A Lesson In Lithium-Ion Volatility -- Don't Try This at Home"

We seem to forget the energy density in these new batteries is very significant. I'm an avid model aircraft flier and the move to Li-Po battery packs for electric planes has offered me two instances of the battery pack going 'thermonuclear'.

Once, in a rapid charging station undergoing a typical cycle, after the pack had fallen 3-4 ft to concrete. The pack blew up like a balloon, developed a blister that rapidly burst into flames jetting out. The other instance was after a crash of an F18, where there was a sudden pop about half a minute after it hit the field. A flame bust up about a foot off the ground with a nasty hiss. What was left of the canopy was a fused mess of EDF plastic.

Vint Cerf: Everything we do will be ERASED! You can't even find last 2 times I said this

Re: Turtles all the way down?

This has already been happening, to a lesser extent! I used to work for a company that re-mediated and dumped the data from vintage 9-track and 21-track tape reels, primarily for the oil industry. It's been a frequent occurrence that shooting seismic data in a location is now impossible due to new construction or political motivations, so companies are looking to re-process vintage data with new technologies. We frequently ran into issues with proprietary formats, undocumented fields, and some forms of obfuscation, forcing us to scour archives for format documentation, hoping it wasn't trashed.

Fortunately, the generations of 30-70 years ago frequently used paper, though I had to decode my share of UNIX 8" floppy disks at times. A few generations from now, our descendants will not have that luxury given our tendency to keep everything digital, the push for cloud storage, and the plethora of disk formats generated over the last century alone.

Humanity can defeat SkyNet with BOOKS, says IT think tank

What ever could go wrong...

That guy 'Murphy' has nothing on 'the law of unintended consequences'...

Read these works of SCI-FI and see if you still think "A.I. in a box" is a good idea.

Harlan Ellison - "I have no Mouth, but I must Scream" - Built for war, AI goes insane and kills all but 5 humans, makes them virtually immortal & then tortures them for eternity.

Dean Koontz - "Demon Seed" - AI traps scientists' wife and impregnates her with a humanoid life form of its own design and mind so it may live.

D.F. Jones - "Colossus" - Yankee & Soviet AI's get together and figure this whole cold war business is nonsense; they decide to optimize humanity and avoid wall altogether. Step out of line and you get nuked.

Brit fantasy artist sues James Cameron over Avatar world

Common Tropes

The suit is so much rubbish. The tree depicted in both works is the Acacia Erioloba, which is the most common tree on the African Savanna. Simply Google 'Acacia Tree' and see what I mean.

As for the floating mountains: It's a common trope. See works from Fantasy artist Christophe Vacher that was doing the floating mountain thing for years before Avatar. And let's not forget the floating Castle of Laputa from Gulliver's Travels!!!