Posts by tyrfing

Apple called on to ditch AI headline summaries after BBC debacle

I wonder if this headline generator is actually less accurate than the average human doing the same job though.

I've seen some really bad and inaccurate headlines.

Are you better value for money than AI?

Re: Back in my day…

The hype around 4th generation languages (counting them as "ones and zeros", "assembly language", "FORTRAN et al. compiled or interpreted", and 'whatever a 4GL is") was that they were supposed to be usable by 'ordinary people". I.e. managers and secretaries (instead of employing those weird "programmers").

And in some cases they sort of, kind of, were. For example, SQL can be used at a much higher level than previous means of storing and accessing large amounts of data.

However, they still need training to use. Or you end up with cr*p systems. See pretty much every set of SQL queries designed by a manager.

Which people eventually learned. So the hype died down, and they're on to the next thing.

Which now seems to be AI.

"Now headcount is coming into focus."

Well that would be because headcount increased drastically a few years ago due to everyone been required to stay home. So internet usage increased and there was increased money flowing in.

But people are not required to be at home anymore, so the money river has dried up. And much of that increased headcount has not increased productivity, so it's just increased cost.

Overall, I think AI is more of an excuse than anything else. It's replacing people that didn't need to be hired in the first place, but it saves face for the boss.

American cops are using AI to draft police reports, and the ACLU isn't happy

Re: Next up

What body pays that fine, with what money from what source, and where does the money go?

Worst case, it's the Mail fining itself, the money going to next year's budget (to be fined again...)

Bitfinex heist gets the Netflix treatment after 'cringey couple' sentenced

I wonder if anyone got their Bitcoin back? Or is it still sitting in the police lockup as "evidence"?

Tech support chap showed boss how to use a browser for a year – he still didn't get it

Re: Screen savers

I have two. Of course these are desktop keyboards.

Re: "learnt many things about how not to run a company"

On the other hand, that sure sounds like Germany has kept the guild system alive. Where do you think the "Master" title comes from?

Are there limits on how many Masters there can be in a given city?

Smile! UK cops spend tens of millions on live facial recognition tech

And this tech likely won't work as planned.

It's a numbers game. Bruce Schneier said it a couple of decades ago when they first got enthusiastic about it. If you scan a lot of people trying to match against a small target list, any given match is far more likely to be a false one.

Facial recognition works better if you're e.g. using it for entrance to a secure facility. Then your target list is a much larger percentage of the people you're scanning.

But police like sitting at a desk and only stirring when there's an alert. Glorified security guards. And a lot of them are likely not much good for anything else these days.

Now Online Safety Act is law, UK has 'priorities' – but still won't explain 'spy clause'

Re: But...HOW?

Whether a law is passed has nothing to do with whether it's practical or even possible to comply with it.

See the law almost passed to dictate the value of pi. Or any other attempt to require a back door decryption ability in an encryption technology.

Legislatures tend not to be experts in any given field, so they rely on expert testimony. We currently have a crisis, more or less worldwide, where we're discovering that many of the experts called to testify on things, are either corrupted or cranks.

Australia tells tots: No TikTok till you're 16... or X, Instagram and Facebook

No penalty for users = no possibility of enforcement.

Even with penalties, I don't think it will do more than slightly slow them down.

I suspect that if Facebook has fewer underage people than it did, it's because it's not the thing to do anymore. They're all on Instagram or Tiktok instead.

Musk, Bezos need just 90 minutes to match your lifetime carbon footprint, says Oxfam

"Oxfam International executive director Amitabh Behar"

Now do his carbon footprint.

Harvard duo hacks Meta Ray-Bans to dox strangers on sight in seconds

Unless they have Facebook branding or something they won't be identifiable as such.

Even if these guys make them as branded (it sounds like they won't, since they did it as a proof of concept), it's possible now.

Cue knockoffs from other people fairly quickly.

It does depend on whether wearing glasses in general will be fashionable. It might be, but we might have a Red Guard movement.

Red team hacker on how she 'breaks into buildings and pretends to be the bad guy'

Re: She doesn't fit the hacker stereotype

A successful break-in involves *whatever gets you in*. Often there is no code-writing involved at all.

It's like when you're changing a business process. Sometimes it involves code, but that's the easy part.

Getting people to actually change what they're doing to a different, better way is much more difficult.

Some of the other commenters are saying things like "I bet their security is much better now." I'm not so optimistic.

After the break-in the people who directly allowed it due to bad practice may actually change that practice. At least for a short time.

Go back five years later and there will probably be someone else doing the same thing though. Among other things because likely very few people are still around in the same role from that long ago.

BOFH: AI consultant rapidly transitioned to new role as automotive surface consultant

He's clued in enough that he likely knows a designated spot close to the building is actually a bad way to maintain your car.

However, there's probably a policy that if you don't use your spot you lose it - unless you're on the Board of course.

Re: It took me a moment to figure out the New Boss

What are the chances that Matthew was hired by the boss's boss (or some higher layer) and the boss is just making the best of it?

Re: "In fact, I've helped a number of people take that first step into the space program."

Since he's clued in, he's already lasted much longer than average.

I suppose he'll last until he gets a directive that conflicts with the BOFH and he chooses...poorly.

After all, that training has a large dropout rate as well.

FCC boss starts bringing up Musk's Starlink dominance, antitrust concerns

Re: More competition ? More constellations ?

Why are we still using terrestrial instruments for astronomy?

There's no reason to put them at the bottom of a well full of stuff to distort the picture.

Learn how to put your instrument on a satellite and launch it. I hear there's a fairly cheap launcher out there...

More seriously, this "clogging up the night sky" is like the people who don't want a moon base because humans might cause pollution.

So you paid a ransom demand … and now the decryptor doesn't work

This has an exact analogue in kidnapping for ransom.

The practice exists today in a number of countries.

To the extent it has been stamped out in some areas, it's because of a resolution that kidnappers get no rest, and *will* be caught, and *will* be punished.

I don't know how to do this for kidnapped data.

What do Uber drivers make of Waymo? 'We are cooked'

A train only has possible savings per passenger-mile due to greater theoretical capacity.

A train that is only used during rush hour and is empty the rest of the time will have much higher cost per passenger-mile than a bus route. You can put on or take off buses; trains come in much larger sizes. Yes you can put on a "half-train", but unless each car is powered (making them much more expensive) you still have a large engine for each one.

There's only so much you can do to compensate for the time change on a transoceanic flight.

It's like working for 24 hours. You can have the nicest chair and all the meals you want. You're still minus on sleep.

- If payment is declining, then either there's less demand, or more supply. Maybe there's more companies in the market. Or Uber is holding back more since now apparently they're employees. Are they now doing payroll and income tax withholding? I bet that's a chunk of the "lower wages" involved.

- Waymo is new, with new cars. Uber has been around; the cars are likely older too. I think there's a lot of turnover in Uber divers, rather like with restaurants. Everyone thinks they can do the job, not many will keep doing it past the first setback or dry spell.

- Waymo will not be able to maintain those electric Jags, or purchase new ones every year to maintain that "new car" smell. The first time a drunk or drugged passenger vomits (or does something else) during the ride, you'll never get that smell out. Why do you think taxi cabs are generally somewhat run down?

Techie made a biblical boo-boo when trying to spread the word

Never use a test message that you wouldn't want going out to production.

Because sooner or later (probably sooner) it will end up there.

"D*ck jokes" and "(boss) is an *ss" are especially bad.

Chinese boffins advocate nuking nearby asteroids – it’s the only way to be sure

"International laws currently do not allow the use of nuclear weapons in space, though one imagines that weighed against the extinction of humanity an exception could be made."

- a body that would cause human extinction is unlikely to be taken care of by any reasonable number of nuclear weapons we could send up in time.

- what about a body that doesn't cause extinction, but is just really bad? I can certainly see lots of people arguing over the precedent it would set, and who actually suffers more harm and whether it's worth it to mitigate that. Meanwhile of course, the cost to send the weapons goes up as it gets closer...

Have we stopped to think about what LLMs actually model?

Yes.

To the extent AI produced text is useful, it shows just how much text on the web is not actually all that informative.

In information theory, the information contained in a string of bits is determined by just how predictable the next bit is. If you can predict the next bit with 100% accuracy, seeing that next bit adds *no* new information.

Woman uses AirTags to nab alleged parcel-pinching scum

Re: "police declined to pursue the matter"

Or you know, don't have a bunch of people who think that taking stuff is easier than working for a living.

The reason there's lots of bicycles in England now is that supposedly they're used a lot in Europe, and "they're so sophisticated".

Why isn't there a problem in Europe? Or are they so poor they have to use a bicycle, but so rich they can just write off a bicycle being stolen every month?

Or is it just not done to talk about it?

On another note: thievery works like many other things in nature on a power law. There's a few thieves who steal most of the stuff. Lock those few up for a long time, and your thievery problem will become much less of a problem.

I would suggest a more permanent solution, but that's probably beyond the Overton window. For now.

Sorry, Moxie. Blaming Agile for software stagnation puts the wrong villain in the wrong play

Re: Really?

VS6 was steady - unless you ran into a bug.

Then good luck getting a fix.

On the other hand, in the latest version they release fixes often, so it looks less stable.

But there's a lot more stuff in there (so more things to go wrong).

US elections have never been more secure, says CISA chief

Re: Recounts

There's a reason it takes days to weeks to count votes in US elections. They're finding out how many boxes of additional votes to find, and they need the time to plant them.

BOFH: The true gravity of the Boss and the 3-coffee problem

Re: caffeine intolerance is a real thing

Well, caffeine is produced by the plant as an insecticide.

We just happen to be a lot larger than most insects.

Techie told 'Bill Gates' Excel is rubbish – and the Microsoft boss had it fixed in 48 hours

A thing that happened to me around 2000. I worked for a municipal government. At the time, departments had been purchasing their own PCs, but it was decided to consolidate them.

At the same time, we would move from (a bunch of Windows versions) to Windows NT on the client machines, Token Ring to Ethernet, and Banyan Vines servers to Windows NT.

Lots of work to get the images together and test versus all the software.

Rolled it out.

Turns out the audio driver would corrupt a Microsoft Access file if sounds were produced while it was open. Much work ensued to remove the audio drivers until a fix could be found. Months later.

Considering all the changes involved, it's amazing that it went as smoothly as it did. That was the only major problem after all.

Bugging out: 53 years since humans first drove a battery-powered car on the Moon

A vehicle designed like the "One Horse Shay".

Tesla that killed motorcyclist was in Full Self-Driving mode

Re: Throw the book at him!

No. In this case the driver is attempting to avoid consequences for *his* decision.

It's illegal to engage that mode in the state of Washington. Regardless, the driver engaged it. He's responsible for the death.

The marketing from Tesla says what it does because it's available in a number of jurisdictions. No doubt some jurisdictions have different laws on this.

Which is why there's also the legalese saying you still have to follow the law wherever you are, and it's *your* job to find out what the law is.

I suspect a lot of this is setting up for the "wrongful death" civil lawsuit from the heirs of the motorcyclist. With "joint and several liability", as long as Tesla is found even 1% liable, Tesla would have to pay out on whatever enormous sum the suit is for while the Tesla driver skates.

NASA swings budget axe, kills $400M+ VIPER lunar trundlebot

Re: Blame It On The Boden

Much more graft involved there, so it's not surprising.

Although it doesn't even have to be actually illegal graft, just the promise of more jobs in districts where the congressman can vote to cancel or continue.

BOFH: It's not generative AI at all, it's degenerate AI

The BOFH and PFY would be bored out of their skulls about an hour after they're the last employees left.

Who would they have to make fun of? Or drop cement bags on?

I guess they would end up perpetually in the pub.

Microsoft founder Paul Allen's tech museum closes, sells off collection

Re: washing

Not sure how well that works for actually transferring the money.

Those salaries get taxed as income; if they're "fat" then likely at the highest bracket.

Admittedly the resume gets a tick, but that's only useful if the kid is planning to work in someone else's company. Investors look at your track record, i.e. was your company actually successful and what part did you have in that? They don't need to follow laws against asking questions on employment, since they're not employing you.

Maybe if their life's ambition is heading up an NGO it's good.

Will Windows drive a PC refresh? Everyone's talking about AI

Re: RE: 3D TV's

Making a movie in 3D uses special cameras, which are very expensive. The shots also have to be set up differently to show the 3d.

Most film makers didn't bother. Many of them can't think of framing in 3d anyway.

So most "3d" movies were filmed in 2d with the usual cameras, then post-processed to add the 3d in, which is why you could see them in 2d.

This did save them the money for the cameras, but it meant camera shots were set up with 2d in mind.

Also, since 3d effectively cuts the light in half, they also ended up much dimmer in the theater than they were intended to be. You can crank up the light coming from the screen, but then the film looks washed out because of lack of contrast.

'Little weirdo' shoulder surfer teaches UK cabinet minister a lesson in cybersecurity

I'm just vaguely surprised that a minister was taking public transit instead of a private car with driver.

As for voter ID, it's always necessary. When you go to vote, how do they know if you're who you say you are? Chances are very good the voting officer doesn't know you by sight after all.

Forget feet and inches, latest UK units of measurement are thinking bigger

Re: Osman is only good for the big stuff

Unlikely - zero times anything is zero.

Turns out teaching criminals to write web code keeps them out of prison

This article is useless.

As far as I can tell, they did a post-course survey of 34 students on their attitudes after taking the course. And this is what powers the study that resulted in a paper.

How many of you have answered a survey after finishing a course for work? How honest were you about answering the questions?

The article mentions nothing about measuring actual recidivism rates for course takers vs. general rates. In other words, did the course actually help them stay out of prison?

Maybe the actual study mentions this (though with only 34 subjects this is unlikely). But the article has a misleading headline as a result.

I see that most commenters got distracted by ragging on the incarceration rates in the US instead. Good job. Squirrel!

FAA now requires reentry vehicles to get licensed before launch

Nah, this is vs. SpaceX.

MPs ask: Why is it so freakin' hard to get AI giants to pay copyright holders?

Re: Begging the question

This is lawyers trying to generate more class action lawsuits, and getting paid enormous amounts of money.

Look at the copyright strikes on YouTube etc. Some of them are legitimate; others are ridiculous - and since YouTube has very little feedback on those claims it can't get better at it.

If it's a law though, there's no need for the lawyers - although they will say that any law doesn't go far enough and try pushing it further.

FTX crypto-crook Sam Bankman-Fried gets 25 years in prison

Well if none of those missing assets are recovered, then about $10 disappeared for every second of his sentence.

Even though I think cryptocurrency is not really an "investment" (where's the income stream?), this sentence sounds very light.

Vernor Vinge, first author to describe cyberspace and 'The Singularity,' dies at 79

I think his speculations about IA - intelligence amplification - are more likely than AI, although not in specific form. They tended to involve surgery, and we don't know how to do that.

And IA is less obviously scary after all.

Congress votes unanimously to ban brokers selling American data to enemies

Erg. Anything unanimously passed is unlikely to be good, or worth anything.

BOFH: So you want more boardroom tech that no one knows how to use

Re: Oh yeah !

Why did we spend ten thousand pounds last year on red paint?

We did have a number of board meetings...

Judge demands social media sites prove they didn't help radicalize mass shooter

Sigh. Civil suit. So they're looking for a lottery payout.

Can AI shorten PC replacement cycles? Dell seems to think so

Please buy a new laptop?

My bonus depends on it...

We asked Intel to define 'AI PC'. Its reply: 'Anything with our latest CPUs'

Please buy a new PC to replace your existing one?

We really need the money...

Otherwise we won't get our bonuses.

Boeing paper trail goes cold over door plug blowout

Re: The wheels are coming off at Boeing

And your point is?

Aircraft are built to last a long time, and get (or are supposed to get) regular maintenance.

It's not like they go out of fashion. or rust (I live in Canada, it's the reason we don't have old cars).

A 20 year old civilian plane is not new, but it should be still perfectly good. There's a 747 built in 1973 that's still in commercial service.

UK finance minister promises NHS £3.4B IT investment to unlock £35B savings

Re: automating the writing and clinical coding of notes, discharge summaries and GP letters

Perhaps they can use AI to generate the letters, and put them on the blockchain.

Then pay for them with crypto.

Is that all joined up thinking? Or do I need to circle back?

More seriously, this article was a complete shower of...buzzwords. Of course, Labour will double down on this stuff if/when they get in.

Dell exec reveals Nvidia has a 1,000-watt GPU in the works

Re: Bitcoin mining 2.0?

Many miners don't actually pay for their power.