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Inside UC Berkeley's High Tech Joke Recommender
alphadogg writes "Every day is something like April Fools' Day at the University of California, Berkeley joke recommendation site, dubbed Jester. Now on Version 4.0, the site tosses visitors a handful of jokes to rate on a scale of "less funny" to "more funny." It then recommends jokes based on the user's taste (or lack thereof), dynamically making recommendations based on the user's most recent ratings.
Jester's more than a joke jukebox though. Underlying it is a Berkeley-patented "collaborative filtering algorithm" dubbed Eigentaste , now on Version 5.0. The more people who use the system and rate jokes, the more data Berkeley researchers have to advance their understanding of recommendation systems, like those used by Amazon.com and other Web sites."
For those who want to actually see it, not a blog about it - Jester
Is crushing a suspect's child's testicles illegal?
John Yoo: "No, [if] the President thinks he needs to do that."
http://eigentaste.berkeley.edu/user/jokes.php
Could this algorithm be applied to porn?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
These are funny once, Mike, not funny always.
"I don't understand, Man."
would be filtered out completely by this, but I welcome our new humor overlords anyway.
It'd be really interesting to use a site like this to try and determine how people's sense of humor (and response to jokes, which isn't the same thing) clusters.
It's hard in this case though because the jokes are so old and tend to fit closely to five or six templates. Because this means they have very little impact, I tried rating them based on how funny I thought they would be if they were new to me and expressed a bit more concisely, which I found a complicated exercise.
If this thing could be loaded with new jokes, or at least varied jokes, it'd be very interesting to observe the results. for example, would we find that people who like gender-stereotype jokes also like lawyer jokes? Would we find that people who like engineering jokes also like pun-based jokes?
Alas, without a system for users to submit their own jokes I don't think there's enough data in the system to get useful results out of it.
P.S. Shakespeare walks into a pub. And the barman says, "Sorry, you're bard."
P.P.S. So this bear walks into a bar, and the bear says "I'd like a......... beer, please." And the barman says "What's with the big pause?"
P.P.P.S. So this woman walks into a bar, and asks for a double entendre. So the barman gives her one.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
I rated 8 jokes and it gave me this recommendation:
Could not connect to user database: Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (11)
I don't get it.
I must say, after ten jokes, it got me spot on. Longer, story-like jokes with ironic or twist ends! Me likes!
In my case it seemed to hit on all the things i hated first and then after about ten jokes in, just started riffing. I wonder how long till i exhaust the database...
...and it should be known by now
Could not connect to user database: Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (11)
It must have real problems with political jokes. Half the people think they're real funny, while the other half don't. And that half changes by joke!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
They are trying to develop the funniest joke in the world.
Slashdot, fix your code or at least hire someone who is competent at it to do it for you.
Before the slashdotting I made it through the 'training' and then through about 20 jokes, it wasn't too bad.
And don't worry, the jokes get longer it's only the initial ones that are the one or two liners.
However, I didn't quite understand the punchline when it gave me this one:
Could anyone clear that up for me?
>> Standing on head makes smile of frown, but rest of face also upside down.
Reminds me of the old saw,
Q: How many MIT Engineers does it take to screw up a light-bulb joke?
A: That's not funny!
[
"Invalid query: Table 'jester5_emptyjokeclusters' is marked as crashed and should be repaired"
God it really works! I found this one to be very funny! LOL
"Invalid query: Table 'jester5_emptyjokeclusters' is marked as crashed and should be repaired" ...err, wait, I don't quite get it.
Hahahahaha that's HILARIOUS!
Didn't Mike do this in the book "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress"?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moon_Is_a_Harsh_Mistress
What browser do you use? FF gave me that after the first 8.
Experience teaches only the teachable. -AH
My sense of humor crashed the joke program!
Invalid query: Table 'jester5_emptyjokeclusters' is marked as crashed and should be repaired
So, who wants to file a bug report on this one? Wonder if someone played a joke on them by submitting their website to Slashdot?
Here's to losing my Karma Bonus again....
How many slashdotters does it take to take down Jester? ...
Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer? Ja! ... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what your country did to you
best one i found....
A man piloting a hot air balloon discovers he has wandered off course and is hopelessly lost. He descends to a lower altitude and locates a man down on the ground. He lowers the balloon further and shouts, "Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says, "Yes, you're in a hot air balloon, about 30 feet above this field."
"You must work in Information Technology," says the balloonist.
"Yes I do," replies the man. "And how did you know that?"
"Well," says the balloonist, "what you told me is technically correct, but of no use to anyone."
The man below says, "You must work in management."
"I do," replies the balloonist, "how did you know?"
"Well," says the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going, but you expect my immediate help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault!"
Hitler beat them to it, I remember seeing a documentary.
-I once had a dog with no nose
-How did it smell?
-Terrible
It was funnier with the pythons
moi
But before it went it actually did seem to be homing in on my sense of humor.
I choose to remain celibate, like my father and his father before him.
Yes, of course I want to give Berkeley researchers my time for free, so they can add that to the public subsidies that pay for their research, so they can patent the technology and charge me to use it later.
I'm the punchline!
--
make install -not war
"Invalid query: Table 'jester5_emptyjokeclusters' is marked as crashed and should be repaired"
Hey, that's pretty funny!
Beta sux! Join the Slashcott! http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4760465&cid=46173047
Q- How many feminists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A- THAT'S NOT FUNNY ASSHOLE! I'LL CUT YOUR DICK OFF YOU SON OF A BITCH!!!!!
Darnn slashdot's lameness filter. Darn it to heck! Bad filter, bad bad bad (hits lameness filter on nose with rolled up newspaper). Yes you stupid humorless algorythm, caps is like yelling. That was the point, you stupid bot.
Speaking of funny, yesterday's Dilbert was one that you have to be a nerd to appreciate.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
If this story had been posted tomorrow, April 1, I would have dismissed it out of hand as some sort of hoax. April Fool's Day is the worst day of the year at /. One of my New Years' resolutions was to not visit /. at all tomorrow. It's just not worth it and, unlike some of those Jester jokes, the stories aren't even that funny.
''Invalid query: Table 'jester5_emptyjokeclusters' is marked as crashed and should be repaired''
I thought it was pretty funny.
Very funny.
The submitter was looking for IT jokes and it was one of the first ones I got (after the 8 tests):
Judy was having trouble with her computer, so she called Tony, the computer guy, over to her desk. Tony clicked a couple buttons and solved the problem. As he was walking away, Judy called after him, "So, what was wrong?"
And he replied, "It was an ID Ten T Error."
A puzzled expression ran riot over Judy's face. "An ID Ten T Error? What's that...in case I need to fix it again?"
He gave her a grin..."Haven't you ever heard of an ID Ten T Error before?"
"No," replied Judy.
"Write it down," he said, "and I think you'll figure it out."
(She wrote...) I D 1 0 T
Q: Why is a fish like a laser?
A: Because neither one can whistle.
Great book. Time for a re-read.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
A scientific survey in 2002 attempted to find the funniest joke in the world. Thousands of people from dozens of countries voted on thousands of jokes. Each country had a different favorite. Overall, the number one and number two funniest jokes in the world, based on votes, are:
http://www.innocentenglish.com/best-funny-jokes/funniest-jokes.html
Health Insurance Quotes
Great, I had my friend who speaks German come over and look at this and now he's dead...
At least he went with a smile....
Life, the Universe, and Everything... in my image.
Hey Man! Would you like to hear a joke?
Well tomorrow is April 1 so when is a better than a Joke rater introduced on March 31. I wonder how will all of the pranks rate on April 2?
http://eigentaste.berkeley.edu.nyud.net:8080/
That's actually one of the jokes, except the answer was trimmed to "That's not funny."
I laughed
This is a bit off topic, and feel free to mod it as such, but has anyone else noticed a new layout for slashdot comments on some stories? I see it on this one, and I guess anything on http://idle.slashdot.org/ is cooler looking. Is this going to be rolled out to all the other parts? At least at first glance, I think I like it.
All your base are belong to Wii.
Only one subdomain of Slashdot (idle.slashdot.org) seems to have gone annoyingly "Web 2.0" for April 1, 2008.
Feh. I want "OMG! PONIES!!1" back.