They Finally Found Out We Like Our Computers

I'm Not There (1956) writes "Sociologist Clifford Nass is talking about how people think of their computers as something like human beings. In one of his experiments, Nass found that people are more willing to 'help' computers when the computer helped them previously: 'When people were then asked to help optimize the screen resolution on a computer where the program had been "helpful," they were much more likely to do so than with the less helpful version.' He also found that people evaluating software's performance were more forgiving if the evaluation was done on the same computer the software was tested on. Nass has recently published the book The Man Who Lied to His Laptop, in which he 'uses our interactions with machines to investigate how human relationships could be improved.'"

Comments

A proposition

[amicusNYCL]

Nass has recently published the book The Man Who Lied to His Laptop, in which he 'uses our interactions with machines to investigate how human relationships could be improved.'

I propose forcing women to think like computers instead of like women. They would be much easier to interact with.

Re:A proposition

[theheadlessrabbit]

I propose forcing women to think like computers instead of like women. They would be much easier to interact with.

What? are you crazy? that would be horrible....Just imagine trying to have a conversation with a woman who continually pauses, buffers, and freezes as she is talking to you... ...damn, that actually sounds pretty awesome!

Re:A proposition

[Zero__Kelvin]

"I propose forcing women to think like computers instead of like women. They would be much easier to interact with."

I guess you either haven't dealt with a women and/or used Windows lately.

Re:A proposition

[Anonymous Coward]

"I'm almost there! Almost! Now I am 39 years from it. Now I am 3 seconds! 99%.... 99%.... 99%...."

Re:A proposition

[amicusNYCL]

I don't think that's very misogynistic. While not disagreeing with your assessment, it's true that I can go out with a woman, learn all about the way she likes to be treated, what turns her on, off, etc, and then think I've got it all figured out. I'll go out with another, apparently similar, woman, and everything I know is now wrong. I give the same set of inputs, and I receive completely different outputs. Sometimes even faults, errors, and outright crashes. Sometimes it doesn't even have to be a different woman, just a different time or day. I do the same things I was doing a while ago, and I get a completely different response with no apparent rhyme or reason that I can detect prior to opening my mouth, all of a sudden there's just a purse flying at my head.

Contrast that with writing code. No matter what computer I run a certain program on, if I give it the same inputs I'm guaranteed to get the same outputs, because the computer is doing the exact same thing the other one was (I realize it's not that simple, but you know what I'm saying).

Contrast that with men, even. If you find a guy, and you figure out that he enjoys having a few beers out, followed by a blowjob, it's reasonably fair to assume that at any point in the future if you repeat your actions, he's going to respond the same way. Hell, I've been with women that I've slept with several times who one night decide they don't want to have sex right in the middle of sex. And yes, I'm sure you're thinking that's also my fault, but they did come back after the first several times.

That's all I meant. I wasn't trying to be misogynistic, Sweet Cheeks. No reason to get your panties in a bunch.

Re:A proposition

[jacquelinew]

I wasn't trying to be misogynistic

Yeeeaaah, that's kinda what I was talking about. Congrats though, now I just figure you're not that great with people in general, most men I know are more interesting than you portray them too.

Re:A proposition

[froggymana]

The UI for Linux isn't bad. Its a lot better than Windows IMHO. There is always room for improvement too though. Personally though, the UI of a terminal doesn't get much better than what its at now.

Re:A proposition

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never understood this 'women are hard to understand" thing. It seems pretty easy to me, since they are just humans, after all. Perhaps if you spent less time thinking about sex you might notice what's going on?

Re:A proposition

[yanyan]

Get a chatroom, you two.

Of course we like our computers

[Locke2005]

They bring us free porn on a daily basis!

Like I needed to know.

[Idbar]

Like I needed to know how to improve my relationship with machines. What I need is a map to get out of the basement and interact with real people!

Re:Like I needed to know.

[Anonymous Coward]

1- Start doing some exercise (Say running instead of crawling to the refrigerator)
2- Now you can jog for a few minutes a day(You don't need to go outside just)
3- Start spending every weekend climbing some mountain
(By this point you are only ugly at worst, it is okay)
4- Do some muscular training (Women dig muscle even on an ugly man - just don't overdo it and become some muscle champion, women don't like small dicks)
5- Get or change job to one that lists female employees (We can't hope to get you into a bar successfully yet)
6- Force yourself to talk to the female employees (Start from the ugly ones just so you remember you don't want to fall for a coworker, they are only the last option if you can't succeed otherwise, the friend zone is your friend. And at this point you are likely to bring sexual harassment charges to yourself.)
(By now you should understand women a bit better)
7- Meet some woman you aren't going to see again (Say a fellow mountain climber) Talk her into a dinner.
8- After she has declined your advancements note at which point it happened and try to fix what you think might have failed. Remember to use what you learned of women thought from your coworkers, what kind of hair or dressing fits you better and the like.
(Volume is important to account for standard deviation, be sure to use equivalent lines for every single woman you meet. If every single woman dumps you before starting you have probably missed something in the previous steps.)
9- IF NOT DINNER GOTO 7
10 - "Damn it worked! It has never worked before! What am I supposed to do?" Nothing. Just talk to her and follow a similar debugging process. Here the goal isn't sleeping with her(That would be an advanced student bonus) you want her to repeat the meetings while knowing you are romantically interested in her. If you are put into the friend zone don't dump her, use as woman thought database material.
11 - UNTIL KISS GOTO 7 (Sorry)
12 - (Now you are pretty close, assuming you didn't force it, if you did you might be close anyways) Tell her you think you might feel romantically inclined towards her. Try to repeat the kissing experience as many times as possible. Then use as many low(but legal) tricks as you can(wine, long late dinners, I missed the last train) to run the final mile. Women can smell your insecurity long after they are into you. It is a lot easier to nail them when one is not an insecure nerd. Remember to bring condoms but not the whole box and if you think you might come in milliseconds that first time practice self-control techniques at home. Also practice for the opposite situation or at least fake an orgasm after about 30 minutes since penetration. Women aren't as tight as hands. Don't try anything but missionary position until the second sex date and don't ever cum on eyes tits mouth unless she asks you to or you are sure apologies will work.
13 - It's not the end, you might break up with her, don't despair, troubleshoot repeat and rinse. You should have a lot more self esteem after sex with a woman who wasn't a sex worker.
14 - ???
15 - Profit

Re:Like I needed to know.

[icebraining]

Pff, I'm not taking advice from some noob who uses GOTO.

Re:Like I needed to know.

[eamonman]

But he was giving you basic advice

I don't know how to maturely discuss this.

[Spazntwich]

Guess this lowers the theoretical barriers to the sexbot market.

We'll see robot girlfriends purposefully installing Microsoft software for the plausible deniability upon contracting a virus.

Wish I could quarantine my W32.Herpes/Worm. :'(

I prefer to beat my computers.

[scourfish]

I'll throw it down a flight of stairs and give them these black and blue smudges on their LCD screens every now and then; but I only do it because I love them, and they have to learn that when I say "bitch, automake me a Makefile," I expect it now and nothing should be reporting to standard error. I'm that machine's user because it wasn't good enough for anybody else.

Re:Not me.

[Anonymous Coward]

I once tossed a desktop in a river. The water was brackish, so it was fresh at times and salt at others. I fished the computer out after a few weeks. After letting it dry, I put it in from of the other computers. I threatened to do the same to the other computers.

I have not had a problem since with any machine. I am often told that the computer problem just goes away when I go near other people's computers to fix them. I think the computers got the message. Piss me off and I will toss you in the river.

The question remains: Can we do that to congress and not get jail time?

Never anthropomorphize computers ...

[Charles Dodgeson]

... they hate it when you do that.