Slashdot Mirror
MIT and the DARPA Network Challenge
mit_team writes "As you might have heard, DARPA has announced a network challenge in the vein of the DARPA Grand Challenge. In this challenge, participants are tasked with finding 10 red weather balloons distributed throughout the continental US for 8 hours on December 5. The idea is to get this to be a crowd-sourcing kind of activity, where people will use social media tools to solve this problem. Our group, the MIT Red Balloon Challenge Team, based out of the MIT Media Lab, has created a system where you get money not just for finding balloons, but for getting people to join the hunt who find the balloons, or for getting people who get people who find balloons, etc. First you have to sign up. Then you can send invitations to others to join through your own unique URL, crediting you with recruiting them. While our team is interested in winning the contest, we are also interested in studying information diffusion in social networks. Does Twitter spread information faster than blogs? Is your blog effective at spreading information? We could use your help in getting out the word. If you sign up and blog about us you will be able to see the impact that your blog has on getting out the word in real time. Win money, help science, and help charity! Kind regards, The MIT Red Balloon Challenge Team."
Sounds like the URLs people use to try and get the "free" iPods and stuff. I expect to see this all over forums soon.
By sending this message out to as many people as possible, Microsoft will pay you...
And I thought Pyramid Schemes were illegal?
Dear esteemed Sir and Madam.
The University of MIT has lost its Identified Flying Baloons(IFB). We need you to locate them for us.
Join this work from home opportunity and you can earn part of $40,000 from your one bedroom apartment! *
If you don't forward this to 100 of your next best friends you will lose out on your chance to have a big enough Multi Level Network to get the reward!
Tetimonial:
"Once that happens, we send Dave $2000 for finding the balloon. Carol gets $1000 for inviting Dave, Bob gets $500 for inviting Carol, and Alice gets $250 for inviting Bob. The remaining $250 is donated to charity."
*(Chances not representative of all entrants. Some terms and conditions apply. See site for details.)
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Our group, the MIT Red Balloon Challenge Team, based out of the MIT Media Lab, has created a system where you get money not just for finding balloons, but for getting people to join the hunt who find the balloons, or for getting people who get people who find balloons, etc.
Maybe you could get Bernie Madoff to help.
Will there be a little boy trapped inside each one?
Of course, these charming folks would never dream of using the project to map out, in a loose but enlightening way, the contacts of some of the more net-savvy people around. And keeping that info for future reference, of course.
Vonnegut would loved it.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
The description of the payouts sounds so much like Amway, I almost ran screaming from the room and torched my computer.
Although it sounds like fun, I can see some flaws in this approach. First off, I think that whatever you don't ask for and lands in your Inbox/IM windows is SPAM if it contains this kind of URLs. People don't ask if you want to participate, they simply assume you would love to participate and will endlessly spam you with mass messages, e-mails and even calls.
...and so on
Last time I have encountered such an URL sharing spree was no earlier than a week ago, due to a stupid site that promised that people would win whatever items if they get a certain number of clicks on an unique generated URL, just like it's the case here. All I can say is that I had to sign out from all my IM accounts because of that, and after things cooled down and I started my Yahoo messenger again, it froze due to the sheer amount of offline messages. Turned out that some people sent their bloody link over 1000 times via mass messages. So it's not funny at all, because people all get heated up about it and apply every dirty trick in the book to get an edge over the others:
- Make redirecting web pages and give you a false link by advertising other stuff.
- Threaten you to click on the link
- Beg you
- Send the link every 10 seconds or so
In this particular case, I'm safe (not in the US) but I've had my share in the past. And I don't like it.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
Bah! Whatever could come of that?
All I can say is those damned balloons better stay the heck off my lawn.
This ain't rocket surgery.
They will. But they'll get stuck in your crab-apple tree.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
It's not just spam, it's a spam pyramid scheme. If this doesn't say something about our culture, I don't know what would.
The MIT Red Balloon Challenge Team is smart enough to begin their social networking exercise with a "discussion" on Slashdot, and a convenient link to join their project...
99 red balloons go by....
You keep using that word.
I do not think it means what you think it means.
3rd post! weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
What time zone are you in? If you're in the States - East Coast, well, starting the party early?
England, it's what, 11:13PM now? And you're pretty piss drunk about now.
Now, if you're on the West coast, it's 3:14PM - off work early?
If you're in the Midwest, I'd be pretty drunk too at this time every day.
Over in Hawaii, dude, having a hell of a lunch are we?
Japan. Ah, drunkedsan! An eye opener for your Saturday before you go into work?
China - what, the government has put a gun to your head and you have to drink!
And if you're in Europe, well, it's in the middle of the night - a weekend night - so, have a good time er, you're blacked out about now so, never mind...
It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
http://balloon.media.mit.edu/evilwombat/ ;-)
I know it's easy to motivate people by the prospect of making a dollar or two however the money would have a greater impact to a charity.
We've created a team to win this prize and we need your help. However we don't offer a dollar or two, just that you get a say in which charity the prize money will go too.
Find us on facebook!
I'll cut myself!
99 Red balloons
Floating in the winter sky
Twittering till fingers hurt
Darpa money going somewhere else
Web 2 Point O springs to life
As our tax-dollars slowly fly
Focusing eyes on the sky
As ninety-nine red balloons go by
a pyramid scheme
Spamford Wallace!
f u cn rd ths u cn gt a gd jb n cmptr prgmng
I mean, bulk rate. Like, buttloads of 'em.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Today it's red balloons, in ten years it will be people who are found (for whatever reason) to be socially undesirable. Be sure to thank DARPA, MIT, and all the other entrants when they kick in your front door.
Not like anyone would even contemplate such a thing of course...
G.
"All citizens, a murderer is on the loose. At exactly 4:23pm everyone needs to go outside and look for this man (picture shown on the TV), if you see him call 911 immediately." - paraphrased from Farenheit 451 f memory serves
This type of thing, if it works would be an incredibly powerful tool in an emergency (you need to find a specific car, a truck with a shipping container, etc.). I'm glad to see DARPA embracing the future they themselves helped create 40 years ago!
MIT's strategy is very interesting. Several groups (like our team) have been forming their teams for weeks, but MIT appeared on the scene just today, and it's fascinating that they got a front-page Slashdot plug. I give them lots of credit for flooding the scene with mentions in such a short time. Whereas some teams give their winnings to charity (like ours), others entice balloon spotters with cash portions of the earnings, and MIT has decided to do a little of both.
DARPA is the sole decider of how difficult this competition will be. Will they place the balloons in dense urban areas, or will the launch them in small rural communities?
Best of luck to all the teams tomorrow, MIT included. I hope that the contest winner will write a paper describing their strategy, both in network-building and in launch-day data collection.
Citizens, be on the lookout for Montag the criminal.
This is only a test using red balloons, so pretend it isn't the largest spying test in US history.
Just kidding : )..
I think the biggest problem with this challenge is its statistically much more likely that random people across the US spot the balloons and report them, or blog about them. The people who find the balloons don't necessary have anything to do with the search teams.
Did you ever wonder how many English speakers think "luft" is German for "red" thanks to the English lyrics of Nena's song?
Edith Keeler Must Die
Somehow hack some satellites and create a perfect algorithm to locate balloons? No big deal, right?
... what will our government be doing while we're all looking up in the air?
Have gnu, will travel.
I wonder if it will spread through /.... ;)
http://balloon.media.mit.edu/tkhamilton
http://balloon.media.mit.edu/timothylord/
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
Laughing at you for not RTFA: the balloons are on the ground.
But seriously, I think what they'll be doing is looking for the red balloons using satellite surveillance. As I've posted before, I think this is the non-secret half of a cameras-vs-eyeballs contest: can satellites find objects of interest faster than a motivated network of humans?
That concerns me. What does the Department of Defense need from understanding the intimate social structures of the nation? So, for free, you're going to voluntarily tell the Department of Defense--those who were once involved in the search for Communists during McCarthy's heyday--everybody you have contact with, or influence over?
Sure, the auspices of the data, in an abstract, non-personally identifying manner, are relevant. But there's another purpose entirely by adding incentive to participate.
First and foremost, it breaks the scientific mold and corrupts the data. All of their data must be taken in the context of the incentive. It can only be applied to other situations that have a similar context. That severely limits the usefulness of the data, and negatively impacts the value of the data.
So what is the true value of this data, and how will it be used in the long run. Also: how long do they plan to keep it? (Until another McCarthy comes along on a witch-hunt? Who then, do you know, that would damn you to interrogation and thorough, disruptive inspection by the DoD?) They say it all with: "Is your blog effective at spreading information?"
I say, "Fuck red-balloons." Find me 10 people willing to die for the sins of everybody that ever lived. Hell, find me 10 Taco Bell dishes that don't make me shit my pants every time I sneeze.
Thank you for reading One Man's Opinion. No participation necessary. Offer void where deemed by law or PATRIOT Act.
Of course I hope people will send me balloon entries at http://red40k.com/ but there is a wiki that lists many other teams.
it is at http://redballoon.wikispaces.com/Groups.
-John Fenley
You're looking for red balloons, you say? Red balloons secretly distributed across our nation by members of our own defense department? Just how deep does this conspiracy run?
Have gnu, will travel.
Congratulations to MIT for winning. https://networkchallenge.darpa.mil/
...had it been won by a group that did not use the Internet at all.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
if posting the article counts as getting new members...