I have loved this stuff since it first came out: listened to the radio series, bought the books (I had an autographed one, until it fell apart), bought the tapes...
I used to be able to quote chunks of the book off by heart.
I loved the film.
They hack it about quite a bit, and often leave out the final line from an already funny riff, which I guess makes it flow better. It took a while to relax enough to just watch it, but Martin Freeman is great, and the Magrathea factory floor just blew me away. In some ways it is a much more *human* film than some of the books were.
As some of the other posters have pointed out, it is not subsidised with taxpayers' money: the situation is more like a default and mandatory subscription to the BBC from everyone in the UK who owns a TV.
Yes, you can't get out of it, but compared to some of the other offerings, it's not bad. Also, any system which keeps Radio 4 going has to be good.
Seems to take a different view. IANALBIWIIPAATALC (...But I Work In IP And Am Taking A Law Course): If you can prove that you were not hired to come up with the idea, and did it on your own time, then it is yours. The classic case is this one: http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/311/70 15/1248.
This case looks harsh, but if you look at the judgment, he brought up what look to me like the key points - that the employment contract was unfair - too late in the appeal process. I wouldn't panic (unlikely, I know with the general level of hysteria on/. these days about IP), because it is not clear if this sets any real precedent.
Er, yes, the Queen is the head of State, and the Government (Prime Minister and Cabinet) set the agenda, but under the unwritten British Constitution, Parliament is supreme, and can basically do what the hell it likes.
So Parliament is in charge. Period. (As I am told they say in America).
In general mankind has an extraordianry ability to destroy the environment it lives in.
Jared Diamond's book "Guns, Germs and Steel" is very interesting on this: He points out that large scale extinctions took place in Australia, North and South America within a few thousand years of mankind expanding into the area; primarily because the animals had not seen humans before, and had not evolved to avoid us.
I have also seen suggestions that the climate of Australia, currently largely desert, is also a result of massive deforestation by humans. Although the native people of the continent are often considered to have been in harmony with the dry environment, it was they that had originally created it by destroying what had been there before.
One other point: When I was on holiday in Crete recently, it was pointed out that in the ancient period when the palace at Knossos was built (source of the legends of the labyrinth and minotaur), the temperature of the island was up to 10 degrees C cooler than it is now. The island is currently dry and hot, largely covered in scrub bush. The main difference betwen then and now?
All the trees were cut down.
As a result, water vapour from the plants was lost, rainfall tailed off, and the island became semi-desert.
Just like the Amazon basin.
Never understimate the *staggering* ability of humans to alter the environment. In some ways, humans are like intelligant locusts, and in geological and evolutionary terms are far too fast for the environment to adapt to properly.
OK: On my (trusty, ancient) Psion, when I want to open a document, I open it, the application is launched. When I close it, it closes the application. Changes are saved automatically, without asking.
If I want a new document, I open a blank doc, and the Psion asks me what I want to call it, and where to save it.
If I open the application directly, it goes to the last file open.
Only problem with this system is if I wanted to revert to a previous version: on the Psion I can use undo, but on a bigger/faster machine I would expect some kind of version tracking.
The upshot is that I don't know or care what the program is, I just open the file and edit it. You never have an empty version of the application floating around: The application itself is transparent, and entirely secondary to the *file* which was what I was interested in in the first place.
Simple.
Any grouches with this system are simply due to this fact: most of us have got so used to the kind of crap that we normally put up with, that we have begun to (God help us) defend it. That's what he means by cruft.
Yeah, OK this is fair enough if you really are talking about a machine that *appears* to be intelligent.
If you are talking about truly intelligent, *self-aware* machines, then they differ from us only in that they run on silicon and not carbon. In that case,in my opinion, the correct moral stance is that they should be equally valuable. Anything else is slavery and speciesism.
Which means that the biggest deterrent to developing an AI on a commercial basis would be an AI emancipation act.
Ummm. Actually it could be made worthwhile if the newly born AI had to work off the costs incurred in its creation, plus, say, 10%.
Waldoes were developed by a guy called Waldo to help him, since he had a muscle wasting disease. So the orginal application *was* to assist the disabled. Info here
Although IANAL, I work in IP, and I am surprised that someone could register Waldo as I would have thought that RAH's estate owned it. Still, weirder things have happened...
Without wishing to seem negative, I think you're all being far too nice about this. Assuming this is not a hoax, then this is a terrble, badly-presented, poorly-researched idea.
It is clear from the above posters that there are a number of artificial languages (lojlan, esperanto, etc) that have been developed as an aid to communication that could be used instead of this ill-defined 'Universal Language': why not just use these?
There is virtually no attempt to approach the problems that people mention of cultural specificity, grammatical incompatability etc; and it appears to me that all they have done is come up with a couple of idiot buzzwords, and got a shitload of funding.
I'm sure that this kind of intermediate layering system (which has been mooted for quite a while) is a way to go for a universal translator, but this project sounds like crap.
Slashdot Mirror
I was at a press screening a couple of days ago.
I have loved this stuff since it first came out: listened to the radio series, bought the books (I had an autographed one, until it fell apart), bought the tapes...
I used to be able to quote chunks of the book off by heart.
I loved the film.
They hack it about quite a bit, and often leave out the final line from an already funny riff, which I guess makes it flow better. It took a while to relax enough to just watch it, but Martin Freeman is great, and the Magrathea factory floor just blew me away. In some ways it is a much more *human* film than some of the books were.
I hope it does well.
Chuck
As some of the other posters have pointed out, it is not subsidised with taxpayers' money: the situation is more like a default and mandatory subscription to the BBC from everyone in the UK who owns a TV.
Yes, you can't get out of it, but compared to some of the other offerings, it's not bad. Also, any system which keeps Radio 4 going has to be good.
My skons are opaque. But then I use organic flour.
I dunno, I though that the Beatles had already bought Apple?
But then I don't really pay attention.
This case looks harsh, but if you look at the judgment, he brought up what look to me like the key points - that the employment contract was unfair - too late in the appeal process. I wouldn't panic (unlikely, I know with the general level of hysteria on /. these days about IP), because it is not clear if this sets any real precedent.
Er, yes, the Queen is the head of State, and the Government (Prime Minister and Cabinet) set the agenda, but under the unwritten British Constitution, Parliament is supreme, and can basically do what the hell it likes.
So Parliament is in charge. Period. (As I am told they say in America).
Chuck
Oh yeah.
In general mankind has an extraordianry ability to destroy the environment it lives in.
Jared Diamond's book "Guns, Germs and Steel" is very interesting on this: He points out that large scale extinctions took place in Australia, North and South America within a few thousand years of mankind expanding into the area; primarily because the animals had not seen humans before, and had not evolved to avoid us.
I have also seen suggestions that the climate of Australia, currently largely desert, is also a result of massive deforestation by humans. Although the native people of the continent are often considered to have been in harmony with the dry environment, it was they that had originally created it by destroying what had been there before.
One other point: When I was on holiday in Crete recently, it was pointed out that in the ancient period when the palace at Knossos was built (source of the legends of the labyrinth and minotaur), the temperature of the island was up to 10 degrees C cooler than it is now. The island is currently dry and hot, largely covered in scrub bush. The main difference betwen then and now?
All the trees were cut down.
As a result, water vapour from the plants was lost, rainfall tailed off, and the island became semi-desert.
Just like the Amazon basin.
Never understimate the *staggering* ability of humans to alter the environment. In some ways, humans are like intelligant locusts, and in geological and evolutionary terms are far too fast for the environment to adapt to properly.
Chuck
OK: On my (trusty, ancient) Psion, when I want to open a document, I open it, the application is launched. When I close it, it closes the application. Changes are saved automatically, without asking.
If I want a new document, I open a blank doc, and the Psion asks me what I want to call it, and where to save it.
If I open the application directly, it goes to the last file open.
Only problem with this system is if I wanted to revert to a previous version: on the Psion I can use undo, but on a bigger/faster machine I would expect some kind of version tracking.
The upshot is that I don't know or care what the program is, I just open the file and edit it. You never have an empty version of the application floating around: The application itself is transparent, and entirely secondary to the *file* which was what I was interested in in the first place.
Simple.
Any grouches with this system are simply due to this fact: most of us have got so used to the kind of crap that we normally put up with, that we have begun to (God help us) defend it. That's what he means by cruft.
Chuck
The technology was apparently originally developed in the Russian space program, and the company involved have been doing reasonably well.
The process is based on hypochlorite, and yes, you can patent a device to make the solution, or to do specific things with it.
Take a look at: www.sterilox.com.
Yeah, OK this is fair enough if you really are talking about a machine that *appears* to be intelligent.
If you are talking about truly intelligent, *self-aware* machines, then they differ from us only in that they run on silicon and not carbon. In that case,in my opinion, the correct moral stance is that they should be equally valuable. Anything else is slavery and speciesism.
Which means that the biggest deterrent to developing an AI on a commercial basis would be an AI emancipation act.
Ummm. Actually it could be made worthwhile if the newly born AI had to work off the costs incurred in its creation, plus, say, 10%.
Maybe I should try that one with my kids...
Not Asimov, but the great Heinlein.
Waldoes were developed by a guy called Waldo to help him, since he had a muscle wasting disease. So the orginal application *was* to assist the disabled. Info here
Although IANAL, I work in IP, and I am surprised that someone could register Waldo as I would have thought that RAH's estate owned it. Still, weirder things have happened...
Without wishing to seem negative, I think you're all being far too nice about this. Assuming this is not a hoax, then this is a terrble, badly-presented, poorly-researched idea.
It is clear from the above posters that there are a number of artificial languages (lojlan, esperanto, etc) that have been developed as an aid to communication that could be used instead of this ill-defined 'Universal Language': why not just use these?
There is virtually no attempt to approach the problems that people mention of cultural specificity, grammatical incompatability etc; and it appears to me that all they have done is come up with a couple of idiot buzzwords, and got a shitload of funding.
I'm sure that this kind of intermediate layering system (which has been mooted for quite a while) is a way to go for a universal translator, but this project sounds like crap.
sorry.
Anybody read 'Titan' by Stephen Baxter? He talks about MicroDisney. AppleDisney aint quite so scary. (Even if it is bull)