Slashdot Mirror
New Project To End Stupidity Online
mrneutron2003 writes to tell us that StupidFilter, a new Open Source project started by Gabriel Ortiz and Paul Starr, plans to provide an intellectual prophylactic for memetically transmitted diseases. "Too long have we suffered in silence under the tyranny of idiocy. In the beginning, the internet was a place where one could communicate intelligently with similarly erudite people. Then, Eternal September hit and we were lost in the noise. The advent of user-driven web content has compounded the matter yet further, straining our tolerance to the breaking point. It's time to fight back."
... no wonder it's so quiet here.
From the project FAQ:
It brings up an interesting question, though. On my blog, I have two layers of filtering against spam, and I'll delete any spam that gets through. I'll also delete the insults and obvious trolls. But sometimes I'll leave the dumb comments intact. I don't know if it's pity, or the kind of amusement one gets out of, say, lolcats, or what.
What I want to know is who this evil Dr. Noone is and why she is allowed to deny things we mere mortals cannot.
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
You AOL whores
Nooo, leave my memes alone, you stupid filter...
Extreme Programming - Redundant Array of Inexpensive Developers
StupidFilter promises to leverage techniques such as Beyesian filtering
And with that mistake, I'm now filtering out FastSilicon.
Never as now, has the phrase, "Nothing to see here. Move along" been more appropriate.
Ryan Fenton
It turns out that this is fairly easy to implement. Right off the bat, they were able to reduce online stupidity by 75% by simply blocking access to craigslist rants and raves, and all blogs.
eleven plus two / twelve plus one
Finally something that will prove the stupidity of that man-made global warming theory and remove it from the liberal religion!
"the internet was a place where one could communicate intelligently with similarly erudite people"
First, BWAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Second, it's not 1978 anymore.
-Rich Cook
Excuse me while I gather the virgin sacrifice and assemble the pentagram required to solve your problem
...but isn't it Bayesian filtering? I mean, if we're going to talk about stupidity on the net, let's call a spade a spade. I'm just sayin'.
You have 830 Friends StupidFilter ON Sorry All the hots chicks have gone you have 10 nerds friends
This just in: Natalie Portman, on behalf of the Hot Grits Council of America and in conjunction with the Reversalmasters of Soviet Russia, has released a statement crying out to end this First Postian genocide. "They are comments just like all the rest. Just because they were born in the mind of a less intelligent person does take away their inalienable rights of commentality."
I got a catholic block.
So, basically, this is going to compare every post against 4chan, and if it finds a match, delete it.
Great idea.
tits or GTFO.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
When their website references retarded 4chan memes like "MOAR" (the link is to preview their moderations of content).
The whole point of filtering stupidity is to get rid of these mindless un-humorisms, not reinforce them. Using these tired jokes on their site is the equivalent of claiming to fight spam but having one of those FWD: FWD: FWD: SEND THIS TO 20 PEOPLE FOR GOOD LUCK!!! emails as your homepage.
Cat got your tongue? (something important seems to be missing from your comment ... like the body or the subject!)
so it's a project that's going to filter itself since it's open sores?
open source is for fags and fags are dumb.
I for one welcome ..[FILTERED]..
Perhaps slashdot should implement a requirement for writing a cogent, unique paragraph before it allows a user to have mod points. Then, if they also change the moderation to be accountable (no longer anonymous, and no longer scarce -- see Kuro5in.org for moderation technology that actually works), it might have a chance at being useful in the sense that one could actually use it to filter messages, instead of being relegated to endlessly observe people use mod points in place of actually expressing a counter opinion.
Then again, slashdot could continue on with completely broken moderation. I could see that as a possibility, given the existing sample set.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
They are going to unplug the internet.
Imagine an outbound firewall that poses a series of questions to anyone who tries to use it.
If you can't solve a grammar problem that requires you to know the difference between "their", "there", and "they're" you don't get to use email.
If you can't choose the correct definitions from multiple choices for "intellectual property", "piracy", "flame", and "rtfm" you don't get to use the web.
If you can't solve a quadratic equation, your computer is set to inbound traffic only.
Problem solved.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
The server at www.fastsilicon.com is taking too long to respond.
:(
Apparently not as fast as someone thought it was
Ok who is the wiseguy that is actually reading the article.
... too bad it'll never be able to detect irony. As a sarcastic person, I rely on savage mockery to let my hatred of idiocy show.
OMG U CN'T BLOCK M3!!!!!!!1111 I R SMARTER THAN U GHEYFAGS
I have this really funny quote that I like to put here. Unfortunately, there's this really annoying thing called a char
They didn't really invent anything here. They just came up with a new name for something.
They call it a "stupid filter," but everyone else calls it an off switch.
First they came for the cliches, but I didn't speak up because I wasn't a cliche. Then they came for the memes...
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
It has been proved, several times through the history of mankind that stupidity cannot be hit. Better waste resources to beat the second thermodynamics law...
Maybe have some sort of ratings system, like the lame ass parental warnings, but for adults. Have something like ST-8, for so stupid that anyone with a cognitive age or eight or above should not watch. For people who blunder onto Faux Noise, they should be warned with a VS-LDSV, meaning Very Stupid - Lies, Distortions, Stupidity and Vitriol.
I hope they are very successful in their efforts. That's certainly a project I'll gladly contribute to.
"In case of emergency, break glass. Scream. Bleed to death."
To one side of the 'getting online safely test' are a bunch of random Google ads. One is for a "See Natalie Portman Naked! Click here! (requires installation of viewer software)" link.
We'll be nice and give them the benefit of the doubt -- they have to click on both that *and* the subsequent screen, that says, "install natalie.exe? Y/N" and only then does the shaped charge in the keyboard go off and blow off both their hands.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Looks like they managed to filter themselves...
warmongering (on & offline) nearing its final phase. the lights are coming up now. check the skies.
t's only a matter of time/space/circumstance.
previous post:
mynuts won 'off t(r)opic'???
(Score:-1, Offtopic)
by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30, @10:22AM (#20411119)
eye gas you could call this 'weather'?
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8004881114 [google.com] 646406827 [google.com]
be careful, the whack(off)job in the next compartment may be a high RANKing corepirate nazi official.
previous post:
whoreabull corepirate nazi felons planning trips
(Score: mynuts won, robbIE's 'secret' censorship score)
by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01, @12:13PM (#20072457)
in orbit perhaps? we wouldn't want to be within 500 miles of the naykid furor at this power point.
better days ahead?
as in payper liesense hypenosys stock markup FraUD felons are on their way out? what a revolutionary concept.
from previous post: many demand corepirate nazi execrable stop abusing US
we the peepoles?
how is it allowed? just like corn passing through a bird's butt eye gas.
all they (the felonious nazi execrable) want is... everything. at what cost to US?
for many of US, the only way out is up.
don't forget, for each of the creators' innocents harmed (in any way) there is a debt that must/will be repaid by you/US as the perpetrators/minions of unprecedented evile will not be available after the big flash occurs.
'vote' with (what's left in) yOUR wallet. help bring an end to unprecedented evile's manifestation through yOUR owned felonious corepirate nazi glowbull warmongering execrable.
some of US should consider ourselves very fortunate to be among those scheduled to survive after the big flash/implementation of the creators' wwwildly popular planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
it's right in the manual, 'world without end', etc....
as we all ?know?, change is inevitable, & denying/ignoring gravity, logic, morality, etc..., is only possible, on a temporary basis.
concern about the course of events that will occur should the life0cidal execrable fail to be intervened upon is in order.
'do not be dismayed' (also from the manual). however, it's ok/recommended, to not attempt to live under/accept, fauxking nazi felon greed/fear/ego based pr ?firm? scriptdead mindphuking hypenosys.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?
Ministry in the Last Days
3:1 But understand this, that in the last days difficult 1 times will come. 3:2 For people 2 will be lovers of themselves, 3 lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3:3 unloving, irreconcilable, slanderers, without self-control, savage, opposed to what is good, 3:4 treacherous, reckless, conceited, loving pleasure rather than loving God. 3:5 They will maintain the outward appearance 4 of religion but will have repudiated its power. So avoid people like these. 5 3:6 For some of these insinuate themselves 6 into households and captivate weak women 7 who are overwhelmed with sins and led along by various passions. 3:7 Such women are always seeking instruction, 8 yet never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. 3:8 And just as Jannes and Jambres 9 opposed Moses, so these people - who have warped minds and are disqualified in the faith 10 - also oppose the truth. 3:9 But they will not go much further, 11 for their foolishness will be obvious to everyone, just like it was with Jannes and Jambres. 12
Continue in What You Have Learned
3:10 You, however, 13 have followed my teaching, my 14 way of life, my purpose, my faith, my patience, my lo
Dvorak seen in New York City just outside Wall Street shoeless and holding a sign: "Will make wild, unsupported predictions for food."
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
How come everyone keeps posting blank comments?
Not only does the stupidity filter help you rise to a higher echelon of intelligence, but it'll save you money, too! Your ISP will be happy to install the stupidity filter on your connection, and it's easy to sign up. Simply stop paying your Internet service bill, and your ISP will add the stupidity filter to your connection in no time! (Allow four to six weeks for delivery.)
Now Firefox users have a weapon against Danny Carlton!
Filter the "blogoshpere". The problem is that there are too many "bloggers" out there spewing complete and utter ignorance. Everything ends up devolving into the political gutter. It's not productive it does not represent proper, civilised discourse.
* client * .. did you get my email .. no, it was caught by our stupid filter
* me *
the article is slashdotted, the website in question is not: http://stupidfilter.org/main/
If this works out like the War on Terror, War on Drugs, War on Poverty, and War on War,... well, I for one welcome the New Idiots to the internet this initiative will create.
The ONLY solution, I could think of, is a "WhiteList" lookup. It would work with a "sand box" a "baby pool", the "shallow end" and "we are so hip deep we R Ultra Kewl Geeks" -- of course, that is the "Deep End" of the Gene pool. You just create a slashdot/wikipedia training wheels program (OK, I do marketing on the side -- sue me for too many metaphors), maybe some sort of proof of community service as well, then when you show someone in the higher level (the "baby pool"), that you have interesting comments, they will invite you in. So, each level will be decided by the one higher, and a social network will decide to move you on up. I don't think you could get more elitist or cliquish if you made a Barbydoll Fans page on MySpace.
At the very top, of course, would be the one guy who created the system, and his sole pleasure in life will be in finding more and more painful and humiliating ways for people in "the Super Kewl Deep End" to try and earn his favor and move up -- but they never will. The "unknown level" will be a myth of the dungeon lord. Who of course, will give it to his son when he retires.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
In the case of this particular project, it's more about the manner of expression rather than the ideas expressed. A short comment consisting of OMGs, LOL's and emoticions, with "ur k3wl i lik ur site" would trip the filter, but (to quote the page again) it "will cheerfully approve an eloquent, properly-capitalized defense of mandatory, state-subsidized rocket-launcher ownership for all schoolchildren."
In theory, if the filter is trained properly, it should also be able to distinguish between non-native speakers who have only a smattering of English (or another target language) and those who write in 1337-5p3@k and SMS-style abbreviations. But that requires the people training it to make that distinction.
Does anybody else hear the song:
;-)
"Wake Me up...When september ends!"
and laugh uncontrollably? Maybe think that Green Day is a bunch of usenet users.
yeah, me neither
NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
...there's actually a cure for b-tardation?
But what if it has the side effect of causing lolcats to go extinct?
Isn't that censorship?
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves that you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. Q.E.D."
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic. (Oh dear, I wonder if any proponents of Intelligent Design have ever read Hitchhikers?)
If there were such a thing as an Online Stupid Filter, it would have filtered itself out of existence.
Due to many/most of its pages being references to suchlike aforementioned stupidity. A blue-light filter works by absorbing blue-light, a coffee-filter works by absorbing coffee (well, the grounds, at least) - any guess what a Stupid Filter absorbs?
Due to the vast majority of The Internet being not much more than stupidity, and in much the same way as a Black Hole will absorb all light and therefore be essentially invisible (we have never *found* a black hole, just a whole bunch of conditions which theory predicts would be "caused by black holes").
Seriously folks, The Stupidity Filter obviously doesn't work - the proof is in most comments on this page (present company excepted, naturally).
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
Sorry, could you say that again? Your post was filtered.
It gets a +5 funny all by itself.
I'm absolutely sure that the guys behind it don't have anything to do!
Am I eval()? - http://www.monst3r.com.br
Has anyone considered the following: I realize that the general consensus is that Americans are stupid. This seems to be the case. But both myself on FreeNode and several female friends and loved ones of mine will tell you that people from some Muslim countries are far worse than any AOL user ever was.
What I'm trying to get at, is that in his quest to stop idiocy, he will probably wind up blocking the entire Non-English speaking world and Non-White Cultures of the USA (Hispanics, Blacks) because those cultures tend to view the Anglo-Saxon English speaking culture with open hostility.
The point is it sounds an awful lot like Ethnic Cleansing since AOL as it existed in those days really doesn't exist anymore. Most of the non-technical denizens of the Internet are like AOL users were in those days.
A more closely relegated division in this time between the AOL Users and normal TCP/IP based users of today is Windows Users and Linux Users. Windows users tend to be poor, undereducated, in non-technical fields. Windows Piracy is rampant in third world countries. (Although OLPC is trying to change that.) Conversely Linux Users tend to be statistically white, male, of considerable wealth and highly educated (generally speaking) and from either the USA ore Europe.
I noticed the boxed-comment thing a few days ago. I think it's a bug in the JavaScript/CSS in the new commenting system. I tend to always get it around the first comment on a page, generally, although sometimes it's further down. It's not a terrible usability issue but it took me a while to figure out that it doesn't (apparently) have any significance.
(This is all with FF 2.0.0.4 on Mac OS 10.4.10 using the subscriber server.)
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
And you didn't link the actual website in the post. It's http://stupidfilter.org
Go ahead, slashdot me. I dare ya.
n savyet rusha, a chezbergur can has a lolcats!
Please stop stalking me, bro.
Eliminating religion has never been tried before.
Good luck.
Well, there goes Digg, MySpace and 99% of all YouTube comments.
This is just another way for The Left to censor speech.
University Speech Codes, Hate Crime, vicious slanderous name calling, physical violence (charging the stage of an unwanted speaker), destroying property (stealing newspapers, tearing down signs), fake agreement (e.g., scientists & global warming) actual government or quasi-government censorship et al. all ways in which the Left shuts down the free marketplace of ideas. One assumes because the Left is afraid their ideas might not stand up to scrutiny.
As The Left has shown that they are afraid of ideas and want to suppress Free Speech. Look at Europe's many many attempts to shut down speech they disagree with. Look at their poor defense of the Mohammad cartoons.
I think the internet is already full of test subjects... That's the whole point :)
Make SELinux enforcing again!
but how about something similar?
How difficult would it be to create a forum of sorts for debates. Following the initial postulates, the argument could be analysed for fallacious reasoning. Think slashdot moderation but instead of -1 Troll, you'd have -1 ad ignorantiam or -1 Ignoratio elenchi etc...
Perhaps it would be possible to distill arguments down to their cores, cutting out all the nonsense, we could then crack each other's heads open and feed on the goo inside.
We're really overdue for that one.
Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril Sensitive Sunglasses have been specially designed to help people develop a relaxed attitude to XXXdangerXXX Stupidity. At the first hint of trouble, they turn totally black and thus prevent you from seeing anything that might alarm you. Ya know...Like comments from
The Facepunch Studios forums already have these guys beat with their forums' Smartness filter. It's awesome. Wish all forums used it. And /.'s discussions while we're at it.
Question everything
Stupid people are so ingenious.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
So if the Stupid Filter can recognize badly formed written documents, could it not thereby be used to correct those mistakes? Would it not then make stupid people at least *read* like they are smart.
But then would that not just equate to the grammer/spell checker in (choose your own Document Editor). So would it then not only be redundant technology, but probably a violation of somebody's patent?
Who modded the parent down? It's on-topic for chrissakes! It's a perfect example of complete and total stupidity in desperate need of filtering.
Terrorists can't threaten a country's freedom and democracy. Only lawmakers and voters can do that.
FWIW.
...the backbones comprising internet itself had to be brought down by their administrators today. It seems an inescapable loop was created the moment this filter happened across itself.
Yup. I thought that there might be a problem with trying to implement stupidity filters. I thought that if it actually worked at all, its first victim would be the stupidity filter itself.
'We have met the enemy...'
Best regards.
In a Moebius strip kind of way, this is on topic.
Why is there a big rectangle around parent's post? I don't recall that feature more than a month ago and I can't begin to figure out what FAQ it is under.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
1) Can past In-duh-vidual comments seed the filters.?
2) Will those members automatically included in a whitelist?
If not:
3) Does membership there qualify for a white list (or black list)?
No.
I rather tend to be accused of creating similar sentences that make Rudolf Flesch spin in his grave.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
It's really easy to surf, for example, Youtube comments and assume everybody is more or less "your peer". But let's face the facts, a huge portion of those comments are posted by kids and teenagers. These people aren't exactly wise, knowledgable or always rational. It gives a false impression that "wow people are stupid!". Would be nice to know when a particularly crass or ignorant comment is just a 12 year old. It would be a whole lot less disturbing than the same comment coming from a 30 year old.
Skip the ad-laden overloaded blogodreck site and go directly to StupidFilter. The concept is straightforward - they're training a naive Bayesian classifier, like a spam filter, on a set of text excerpts rated by humans. You can look at random samples from the training set for amusement.
Wikipedia already has some 'bots that do somewhat similar things, looking for totally bogus edits and reverting them. Yahoo's "commercial intent" filter also does something like that, to separate commercial and non-commercial sites. We considered something like that for SiteTruth, where we need to distinguish non-commercial sites so we don't rate them by business criteria.
This approach to filtering will probably need domain-dependent filters. A political site, a social site, a sports site, and a game site all need different training sets. I'd go for a two-stage classifier, one that divided sites into about ten to twenty major categories, and then a stupidity filter trained for each of those categories.
Applying such a filter at blog posting time should be interesting.
And the characters in these books, and plays, and so on, and in real life, I might add, spend hours bemoaning the fact that they can't communicate. I feel that if a person can't communicate the very least he can do is to shut up. - Tom Lehrer.
StupidFilter is redundant.
We don't need to filter stupidity. That's easy. Both Slashdot and Wikipedia systems (albeit very different ones) do it very well. We need to filter misinformation, omissions, lies and logical fallacies instead. That's the hard part; because these often appear quite logical.
To verify this:
First, the rumours passed around from urban legends.
Now his SAT scores from CNN were 566 verbal and 640 math.
And from here we have a setup of pre-1974 SAT scores against IQ.
His score of 1206 combined sets him up with an IQ of about 130.
Now, from the IQ we can look at a distrubution of IQ versus percentage of people with such an IQ to see where a 130 IQ puts you, and it's in the top 2.5% of people.
Bush has been a terrible president and will probably be the first president to preside over 2 recessions but he isn't stupid.
I think this is the first time I've seen an oxymoron embodied as a software project.
if (postText.equals('first'))
;)
deletePost();
That's a good chunk of stupid posts cleaned.
> All too often on Slashdot people actually believe that "Smart==Thinks like me" and "Stupid==Doesn't think like me"
That only happens in YRO. The rest of Slashdot is surprisingly sane by comparison with practically anywhere, and I have pretty much default filter settings. Anonymous moderation works, in its own subtle way.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
...back on the WeLL. Replaced anyone's offensive stupidity with " (bozofiltered )". I wore a pager on my belt, which was the style at the time. You couldn't get those white ones...
Personally I advocate a slightly different approach: the stupid tag. Before getting an internet connection, everyone would be required to take a basic computer competency test, perhaps with some general social questions on etiquette as well. Pass the test, and you get a regular connection. Fail it, and everything being sent out by you gets tagged with the stupid tag, which people can then filter by. Would require some infrastructure work, but I believe it would be worth it.
That sounds like a stupid idea. Will the filter filter itself?
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
I, for one, do NOT welcome our sesquipedalian overlords. Sometimes "More and longer words" =/= "better than"
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
Unfortunately, the stupid people have numbers on their side- not to mention people who are really smart in some areas (like being able to write bots that can bypass lameness filters) and really stupid in others (like thinking goatse is a fun picture).
You are reading a copy of my copyrighted post.
1. This project is online
2. It's aim is to end stupidity online
3. But ending stupidity online would require the removal of this project.
4. Repeat, Recurse And Profit!!!
My brain hurts.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
The default homepage for all browsers is locked to this http://www.coolquizme.com/blondbusy1.html. Or you close the internet.
> Excellent point. I believe that stupidity is protected under the first amendment. I should also note that stupidity is fought in the fifth.
That's only because it's illegal to fight it with the second amendment...
I'm thinking more "your thinking off digg". They might call you a "looser", too.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
If you want to believe stupidity lies within bad grammar and spelling, then go ahead. I have seen much deeper stupidity from otherwise educated people that argue in favor of 'intelligent design' and the like.
See my subject line, because that's always the price of a statement like that site has. It really depends on who is looking & @ what.
...my sig wrong?
Oh boy...
Humanity outsmarting divinity and stupidity with one blow?
Yeah... right... what will all the religious freaks and politicians do then?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
... of Slashdot??
So since they are stomping out idioticy, does that mean all "conservatives" are pre-banned?
The FAQ on their site leads me to believe that what is being attempted is not much different from spell and grammar check along with parsing for some teen/street vernacular. If this is the case you are simply going to exclude those with a poor command of English and those who lack the sort of education you get at Ivy League / Oxbridge type institutions. More importantly if the stupidity is algorithmically determined then it can be algorithmically fixed. Thus DumbCheck(Tm) will change LOL to "Your remarks are risible in the extreme". As all readers of this site know stupidity is not the problem. It is trolls, flames and those spoiling for a fight on whatever grounds. "Attitude Filter" seems a much worthier challenge.
"lose" and "loose"
Republican leadership = Idiocracy
Well why stop just there?
Use your head, can't you, use your head,
You're on earth, there's no cure for that - S. Beckett
My belief exists that those who type comments/etc in all-uppercase are mouthbreathers. It's 2007. The days of computers with no caps lock control are long gone. They don't deserve a voice on the internet if they are using cruise control for cool.
this is why i prefer my elitest hangouts.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Every time they do something like this, somebody just makes better idiots.
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
Stupidfilter + mysql = stupid
FTA: "a few lines of code could outthink your average testosterone challenged, uncivil Netizen" Do they really mean that people that lack testosterone are uncivil? I mean, emoting does get pretty out of hand sometimes, but I'm sure anyone would agree that "testosterone fueled" angry posting is a bigger problem than being "testosterone challenged".
For example Collaborative Filtering.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_filtering
A simple thumbs up or thumbs down for any particular link would be all that's needed to move the user further away from one statistical grouping and closer to another. Then everyone will be in a group of similarly intelligent people. Each page and each link on a page could be given and display for example, a likely percentage match (12%) with your preferences (89%).
It would require a shit load of servers to run the backend and a preference bar which can integrate with the browser. However, with billions of people in the world it's highly unlikely that any individual would end up in a grouping of 1.
Deleted
Oh, that's really interesting. I was not aware that the SAT had changed the test besides the changes they've made in the past few years, so I just compared it to today's scores (where 566 and 640 are... *cough*). I guess he's not quite as bad as I thought he was. ;)
Grammar Nazi
Anonymous moderation is subject to its own sets of abuses, but "accountable" moderation is no panacea.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
http://www.privoxy.org/
Small correction: Bush probably *had* an IQ of ~130, but then he started drinking, and to keep your IQ as you grow older you actually have to work for it even under ideal circumstances, which alcoholism isn't one of. Then there is the question what IQ has to do with your ability to be a good president.
His score of 1206 combined sets him up with an IQ of about 130
People can test well and still be stupid.
"Beyesian" filtering will be used to filter out those less intelligent than the article authors? Positively iron-clad. This article is a brillant idea, and I'm glad I thought of it.
Slashdot is doomed!
Have gnu, will travel.
I bailed on kuro5hin.org a couple of years ago. Basically, it had become popular enough and let people vote on enough things (what got published to what pages, etc), that it seemed that the teaming masses of idiots were running the place. And basically they were.
/. may suck, mostly the crap sinks to the bottom, and good responses float to the top. Especially if you change your modifiers so that responses marked mostly "Funny" are given -2 in your personal filter.
As much as some of the editors here are idiots. As much as they fail to edit. As much as they abuse their editorship (quips in the article, changing article text), they are also answerable to someone. And I think that's probably a good and important thing.
And as much as the mod system here at
How did you get your post to come out blank like that?
Slashdot usually requires you to put *something* in the comment field.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Though, my version goes back to the point where graphical user interfaces started taking over the desktop, giving rise to self-proclaimed computer "experts", who really know nothing about what goes on under the hood. The types who go out and buy the fanciest, fastest setup on the market, brag about it mindlessly for a few days, then end up having to call you to fix something stupid they did to it.
Whatever happened to the days where you almost had to know how to program a computer just to use one? And why is it that computers rarely come with easily accessible programming tools available to the user from the very first time they boot up the machine?
(Then again, I'm betting the pre-command line interface folks are getting a good laugh at this post...)
8==8 Bones 8==8
Surely you jest? Are you referring to the site founded by Rusty Foster?
Tongue planted firmly in cheek...
Ruby Neural Evolution of Augmenting Topologies
In the beginning, the internet was a place where one could communicate intelligently with similarly erudite people.
Well-educated folks can be some of the most stubborn and rude. Perhaps the percentage may be a bit lower than that of the "commoners", but it is not hard to find angry diatribes from the "educated class".
Table-ized A.I.
Just one little question: they mean to say they're software recognizes stupidity based on the words? What about the meaning in context? You can't claim the amout of stupidity in a text based on the words used. Sure, you can get some of it right (lke ppl who writ lke ths -- annoying), but what about real stupidity? What about internet trolls and the like?* You need semantics to actually get this right, and I know only two ways to manage this: get people to say what is stupid (bad**) or annotate text with the semantics and let the computer decide (bad too, involves people and infinite work).
/.?
And no, I don't believe in Bayesian systems.
*Am I going to get in trouble for saying this in
** I say involving humans are bad because it would be difficult to get consensus, in any way you try.
recently after the goatse revival thing i decided to use that site as my Halloween prank to some of my msn contacts. some of the called me stupid. stupidity is not malware. people can (can they?) recognise what is valuable content. pass on.
Now, if only they were able to port this to be a squid plugin....
I already enjoying an ad free experience, why not make it idiot free!
If any of you are using a linux box as a home router, I highly recommended looking at Squid+Adzapper+Prefetch
Especially when you're being tested on synthetic geometry. Knowledge of which clearly made George a brilliant leader.
I like money though
Stupid filter is not in charge of Gundam. 'Nuff said.
When people will get this that Bush isn't that stupid. However, his and his "elite" reasoning seems very wrong to us. Why? Because they simply think and therefore act different. They are shortsighted, and this is a catch - lot of clever people have been. Cleverness and high IQ have nothing to do with skill of insight, skill of understanding balance of the world, skill of knowing how to vet out our opinion and not to be so righteous about it. Skill of understanding of giving something good and getting it back.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Since it's not possible to define stupidity universally, all I see is more censorship. In the end, this technology will be used to suppress all opinions different from the mainstream.
If you want intelligent conversation on a topic, do your own site, and be a dictator: ban every user which does not conform to your own standards. It's a good and effective way to maintain a certain level of quality. It may not sound very democratic, but it is more democratic than you imagine: it allows certain people to maintain a specific view/quality of conversation that fits their mentality. If you don't like it, don't go there.
O_O it's fun!
An interesting idea, applied to slashdot each user, or more advanced users could use own custom Bayesian filters, to block out what THEY think is stupid, other people would still see it but they wouldn't.
Technically this will be just a spam filter, a language classifier, the same could be used with almost no modification to filter out (or keep only) the funny comments.
Now if I could find a way to apply this in the physical life (i don't want to use the term 'real life', and this is the best i could come up with), it would be great.
These people are apparently unaware of the law of unintended consequences. With fewer stupid people able to post on the Internet, their stupidity will have no outlet. This will leave significantly more stupid for face-to-face interactions! I prefer avoidable/ignorable virtual stupidity to real, possibly harmful stupidity in close physical proximity to me or my loved ones. The creators of this software should have thought this through before unleashing their terrible creation upon the unsuspecting populace!
Bring on the asteroid
If a stupid filter works like a coffee filter, does that mean that they'll end up with a super-dense blob of stupidity in the strainer? If they keep filtering, maybe it will collapse making a stupid star or some such. A shining beacon of our stupidity for future generations. Of course, I can imagine some careful handling would be required, in case anyone becomes "infected" with stupid.
;-)
The mind boggles... well, it would if I had one
This filtering idea is so stupid, it will filter itself out of existence, hopefully with a bang. The Internet loves a good bang.
Srsly. Why. The stupidity is amusing, it's something I actively seek out after a hard day of cognitive activity, for some much needed laughter. Don't take away my 14 y/o's and their antics.. Plzkthxlolbbq.
Clearly, by Kelvin's 3rd law of stupidynamics, stupidity can neither be created nor destroyed. This leaves the serious problem of how to dispose of the stupidity that would accumulate in the stupidity filter. Given the enormous amount of stupidity that circulates on the web, the filter would become full quite quickly and it would be far too dangerous to simply discard it. I suspect that storing stupidity in volume would present many environmental issues that would not be resolved easily. The problem of disposal of the accumulated stupidity could render this project impracticable for the foreseeable future.
(Before anyone asks the predictably stupid question: Kelvin's 2nd law of stupidynamics doesn't exist and the 1st law is largely discredited although still supported by a small religious sect inhabiting the northern regions of Tibet.)
Now I have to worry that the filter has been in place for years...and I am on the wrong side. It would explain so much.
Finally, I can have some peace and quiet on the web. Now that they are getting rid of all of the idiots I have it all to myself...what?...hey, you can't kick me off!
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
No offense, but that may be the dumbest thing I've ever read.
It's called narcissistic filter.
Can I filter Stupid Filter using Stupid Filter?
The mere notion of creating a Stupid Filter is stupid. That's why it may be the next Google.
Remember the last time someone tried to get rid of all the stupid people? Everyone else left behind got killed off by a virulent disease contracted from an unexpectedly dirty telephone.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
This project is bound for failure simply because bayesian classifiers don't work that well. In the end, they're really good at picking up spam because spam contains a lot of keywords which are east to pick up. Stupidity implies that there is some comprehension at work, not the mindless firing of keywords. People who would like to see another take on this should look at Utu, A reputation based system that penalizes people for being hated by the community. A lot more thought was put in to this project, and it already has a working client/server model which you can download.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
it must be so reassuring for the small minded good spellers among us to equate grammar w. intelligence! that seems to be the running theme of comments. unfortunately, well-worded comments =! intelligence comments.
sigh.
wish p0epl undertood dat!
Contemplate the marvel that is existence, and rejoice that you are able to do so.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You make a funny on stroking the mod's ego and poof - funny (too bad no karma, but who really cares).
You just make a simple, deprecating observation (my original post) and poof - redundant.
Two out of three really isn't too bad for the mods. I usually would give one in ten odds of a mod making any sense at all. Hats off! An excellent day in Mod ville. Take the rest of today off!
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Anybody else find it ironic that only 36 people dugg this article?
I'm very sorry that I upset you with my careless coment.
I misunderstood the tone of your post.
I try to very hard not to inflict my opinions on others and even more so never to do so uninvited.
I attempt to only post on the topic of the thread and not start threads unrelated to articles.
That being said I don't understand what your opinion IP rights have to do with Slashdot Moderation.
Or what Slashdot Moderation has to do with firewalls in tanks.
Remember the rule "Don't feed the trolls" even if it is suggesting appropriate means of removing them it's still attention stoking their fire.
But I do think you are being unreasonable and just a bit paranoid.
As I understand it the mod-point system is more or less automated, so any hobbling would be a result of a conflict in your posting habits and tone of posts rather than an active denial by "The Counsel of Mod Points".
Yes I do understand your anger at Mod Point bot nets or whatever you want to call it but little can be done to prevent that in a community of programmers with strong opinions.
This proposed "filter" promotes exactly the kind of behavior it claims to prevent, and there are already methods in place to reduce the presence of "stupidity" when we need to.
..., xn". In other words, they give you the sense you're in a junior high classroom. Now, this filter turns the former statement into "my penis is bigger than yours because i'm more intelligent than you are". It's just as elitist, and just as invalid. There are people you might call stupid, but they happen to be CONSIDERATE and they are at least willing to learn, or to change.
So wait, let's stop and think of what we see as "stupid" on the Internet. From what I've gathered from the consensus of people on Slashdot, stupid is anything you find in the comments on digg.com. In general, these comments tend to have elitist qualities with chauvanistic implications like "my penis is bigger than yours because of arbitrary qualifications x1, x2,
We already have means for dealing with this as well. In closed forums, we ban the offending individual. In open forums, since they're open and all, we ignore them.
I really fail to see the necessity of any sort of filter, unless it's to impose your own, elitist regime on everyone else.