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https://neil.fraser.name/writi...

TFA: The results are intriguing—even a relatively simple neural network can be used to over-interpret an image, just like as children we enjoyed watching clouds and interpreting the random shapes. This network was trained mostly on images of animals, so naturally it tends to interpret shapes as animals.

Less intriguing: to consider that similar networks (especially once giving "recommendations" to unquestioning end users) might ascribe e.g. criminal propensity or lack of creditworthiness to the odd proverbial "innocent bystander" by over-amplifying distinctions they "think" to have learned.

The "Bad Blue sky" tank detector https://neil.fraser.name/writi... "might be apocryphal" (just like the Obstinate Lighthouse http://www.snopes.com/military... ;-)) but instructive nonetheless.

I think the the HTML reference comes from several links deep, not specifically, but topically:

Of the two classes described, neither teaches computer science. The first teaches keyboarding and use of Microsoft applications, while the second teaches website design. While the website design course claims to teach the use of "HTML programming code," this is a misuse of the term, as HTML is a markup language rather than a programming language and requires no understanding of algorithms or program design.

http://blog.carolynworks.com/?p=572

Which was summarized in the article like this:

Teachers often refuse to teach real CS because more often than not they don't understand it. Instead, they end up teaching word processing and website construction, while calling it CS.

http://neil.fraser.name/news/2013/03/16/

So essentially he's saying that US CS curriculum is so bad, students can't even do html, which actually isn't programming anyway, it's just a kind of text formatting.

As others have commented, Linux is competing with free copies of Windows. Further, it lacks the games that the Chinese want (also free).

It's extremely frustrating when I see people pirate something when there are free alternatives. One could argue that the free/FOSS alternatives for certain classes of software aren't good enough, but there are enough cases nowadays where the quality of the free stuff is sufficient enough to make this something of a cop-out.

A Google engineer recently blogged about his experiences in Vietnam and how computer science was taught there (http://neil.fraser.name/news/2013/03/16/). The story itself is interesting enough (when it comes to computer science Vietnamese kids kick the ass of American students, to the point where half of the students in one particular grade 11 class could pass the Google interview process), but he mentions this:

By grade 3 they are learning to how to use Microsoft Windows. Vietnam is a 100% Windows XP monoculture. Probably all with the same serial number. However, given that a copy of Windows costs one month's salary, it's easy to understand.

Touch-typing is taught using Microsoft Word. As with all their software, it is in English, which adds to the difficulty at that age.

Linux/LibreOffice is free, and yet still ignored. Obviously they aren't concerned about the BSA breaking down their doors to arrest everyone (yet), but it'd be nice if more countries with limited funds learnt the same basic techniques with more open source software. If you can't even give away your software, then Microsoft clearly have nothing to fear.

Prisoner 6: "I recorded a video of police beating the crap out of a teenager for no good reason at a bus stop."

http://neil.fraser.name/news/2010/12/23/
http://neil.fraser.name/news/2011/04/28/

P.S. There is a good ending to this story: follow the links to the blog of Neil Fraser, a Google engineer who bailed the guy out after he spent seven months in jail, accused of, since video recording police is not illegal... "attempted lynching"....

Prisoner 6: "I recorded a video of police beating the crap out of a teenager for no good reason at a bus stop."

http://neil.fraser.name/news/2010/12/23/
http://neil.fraser.name/news/2011/04/28/

P.S. There is a good ending to this story: follow the links to the blog of Neil Fraser, a Google engineer who bailed the guy out after he spent seven months in jail, accused of, since video recording police is not illegal... "attempted lynching"....

Thanks for the link, which leads to the blog of a Google Engineer ...Perusing... MY!!!! Look at what Google employee's do in their free time:

http://neil.fraser.name/news/2011/04/28/

Admirable.

one of these... http://neil.fraser.name/news/2008/09/13/

Done!

see http://neil.fraser.name/writing/tank/

You mean we'll have Yahoo CDs to make Cold Cathode lamps out of now, too? http://neil.fraser.name/hardware/lamp/

Your return flight. It's cold and wet over here. The Camera Obscura in Edinburgh is very geeky. The Glasgow Science museum is very good. Mail me for more along with what you're interested in. http://neil.fraser.name/

I hope they bombard us with Free VoIP trial CD's!
As I sit in my throne http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_intro.html I contemplate all the wonderous things which I could create from these circular wafers of enjoyment.
I might be able to create a VoIP ATA to complement my desk lamp http://neil.fraser.name/hardware/lamp/
...
Or I could just wang them at my brother like I've done with the last hundred or so I recieved.

The problem with popups is that clicking the back button was not enough, one had to clean up the mess -- sometimes a mess that would keep respawning itself. Floaters look superficially similar to popups, but floaters are completely contained within the window. That makes them just another (usually bad) design feature.

You sir, are a WEIRDO.

If you look carefully, you can compare those photos to the ones I took in 2000, and can see the increase in decay.

What strikes most people who stand next to it is how *big* it is. Yes it is big on the scale of a human. Maybe I'm weird, but what struck me was how *small* it is. It can go to the Moon and come back, yet it's smaller than a freight train.

Thanks Jamie & Cecil. I've increased my polling to six times an hour and will let you know if I start getting errors again.

Stats show that usage of my Slashdot feed is slowly declining. This is most likely due to the gradual migration from Mozilla (which has that great sidebar) to Firefox (which has its own RSS abilities).

Your policy may be fair (I'd argue against that, personally, but there's not much point in doing so) however your implementation of that policy varies wildly, or at least it used to, and if you don't acknowledge at least that it used to suck (because it certainly did) then you're going to come across as if you don't actually know the situation well enough to know whether it sucks now either.

My friend, Neil Fraser has had no end of troubles with a fairly legitimate utility he created. Which is even linked on slashdot's code page as being under "ultramode".

Your policy may be fair (I'd argue against that, personally, but there's not much point in doing so) however your implementation of that policy varies wildly, or at least it used to, and if you don't acknowledge at least that it used to suck (because it certainly did) then you're going to come across as if you don't actually know the situation well enough to know whether it sucks now either.

My friend, Neil Fraser has had no end of troubles with a fairly legitimate utility he created. Which is even linked on slashdot's code page as being under "ultramode".

Your policy may be fair (I'd argue against that, personally, but there's not much point in doing so) however your implementation of that policy varies wildly, or at least it used to, and if you don't acknowledge at least that it used to suck (because it certainly did) then you're going to come across as if you don't actually know the situation well enough to know whether it sucks now either.

My friend, Neil Fraser has had no end of troubles with a fairly legitimate utility he created. Which is even linked on slashdot's code page as being under "ultramode".

First it was a lamp now it's a throne. I guess the next logical step is an AOL CD house.

The body of the trap is made from a shortbread tin. Mice enter through a hole cut in the lower-right side of the tin. Once inside, they are forced to walk though a toilet paper tube to reach the bait. On the bottom of the tube is an infra-red LED which is aimed at a photo transistor at the top. These components are taken from the write-protect sensors of a 5.25" disk drive. When the light beam is interrupted, the floppy drive's main motor starts to spin. This instantly retracts a piece of coat hanger wire that was holding the door open. The door (which is made from shielding from a television set and is hinged with a rod from a clothes drier and a drinking straw) falls closed, and is secured by five fridge magnets. A switch from a vending machine detects that the door has shut, and cuts power to the motor. A computer power supply provides 5v for the sensor and 12v for the motor. Only minor modifications had to be made to the floppy drive's controller board to get it to spin the motor when the infra-red sensor was tripped.

If you are visiting London's Science Museum don't forget to visit the Charles Babbage exhibit. You'll never look at a computer in quite the same way again.

No. Taken to the extreme, this exploitation could cause the train system to stop. Which is what it did.

Ever since the Victorian era, trains are designed to stop if there's a failure. That's what "fail safe" means, not that it is "safe from failure" but that "when it fails, it is safe".

For a simple example, take a look at the _mechanical_ switching gear on the tracks behind my office. More modern electronic or computerised equipment is exactly the same in terms of how it reacts to failures.

Neil Fraser has built a 48 CD AOL Lamp.

Tierce

I'm sorry, but Slashdot really needs a '-1 Wrong' mod point.

The .name TLD will sell you any third-level domain that you want. Just like *.co.uk or *.ny.us does. The DNS lookups are perfectly normal. The email is perfectly normal. What more can I say ... what you stated is completely untrue.

And yes, I do know what I'm talking about. I'm a sysadmin, and owner of my own .name website. Go ping it.

You bet. My personal website is one. I got tired of moving my website from one employer's domain to the next. So I invested in a .name so that I'd have a permanent address.

What were my choices? I'm not a corporation (.com), or a network (.net) or a non-profit org (.org). I'm not sure if in the long run I want to stay in the UK (.me.uk) or return to Canada (.ca). So .name was perfect for me. It's just me.

Now the million dollar question is what will happen to my 'permenant' .name if the TLD goes .bomb? Will it be grandfathered? I bought it explicitly for stability.