Semantic web is an amazing adea that will profoundly transform the way we interact with information. But I can see huge amount of work remaining to be done:
We need an ontology that will cover many if not all aspect of human experience. And this experience has been evolving dramatically and will continue to evolve. This ontology is probably a moving target. This task alone of creating the ontology has been, and is still the holy grail of AI and Knowledge Management.
The amount of time we will have to invest in adding metadata to the data will dramatically increase over time. We will need a way to automate the filling of the metadata layer. This is where kicks in automatic image recognition and classification, speech to text, text summarizer and meaning extractor (Here, Copernic is is the right direction). Maybe the librarian profession will be the next hot job...
Almost every application will have to adapt and inter-communicate. No big deal, RDF will probably become the new data bus anyway.
Within five years, the telco world will have changed.
We will observe a strong fragmentation of the telecommunications world as many small companies will try to get their share of this multi-bilion dollars market. And just because of the low entry cost (look at asterisk, Convedia, Ubiquity, Appium, and many other players way too numerous to list here), you don't have to be a huge company to deliver services in that emerging market of VoIP services (here, by VoIP services, I don't only mean providers, but also secondary services like voice recognition, IVRs, vertical markets services, unified messaging, value-added access resellers, etc.). Maybe after, the market will reconsolidate though.
VoIP is to telco what PC was to computing, what the Amiga Video Toaster was to TV productions, what Napster was to RIAA, what iPod was to MP3 music, what Internet was to information access, what Word, Excel and Powerpoint was to corporations,... It's a disruptive technology.
It's a fact; those who can't adapt to their changing environment will disappear. And new dominant players will take their place in a new order...
I wonder what my phone (ok, communication device) will look like and will allow me to do in 5 to 10 years from now.
In a network, there are two basic elements: nodes and links.
A social network is the same; there are individual and there are relationships.
What Rheingold is identifying are logical domains within the set of people-relationships elements. In a social network, a domain is an attribute shared by many nodes (individuals). These nodes are then linked in a losely manner so that they don't know they are related, but they are. For example, some people read and react to the same news articles (local, state or national newspaper - participating in corresponding local, state or national trends), the same blogs, the same books, they buy the same technology, they download the same software, the same MP3, they share and exchange ideas and influence without being conscious about it, this is what Rheingold calls "unconscious cooperation". The typical idea of a flock - nobody is driving, but the flock (the logical domain) is acting coherently, without the individual being fully aware of their participation to the group - this reminds me vaguely Theillard de Chardin's Noosphere idea...).
Mobs (the subject of his previous book) is just a subset of this.
Nothing really new there, just that he extends his Smart Mobs concept beyong wireless mobility, to other human activities.
I remember using that kind of tactic back then... I was in charge of a research group and we had to produce a huge specification document for friday 17h00. Of course it was not ready on time. So I decided to try something. I first included a few copies of the document (10 or so) in a zip archive, I then encrypted it using PGP, then uuencoded it, performed a shuffling on it and finally zipped-it again and re-PGP it. After removing the heading, I renamed the thing "Spec_1.0.doc" and send it to our customer. Of course we worked all weekend completing the document but at least, it registered, as our contract required, just in time. The customer came back to us one week later saying that they were not able to open the MSWord document. "Oh! (we said), gee! This must be this email thing AGAIN... we've been having this problem lately... let me resend it to you". And I sent the (new, completed and heavily revised) document. The customer were happy because the document were very good, and so were we.
I think this time-dilatation technique has been called 'Ed's relativistic document delivery' in that company I used to work. I just called it 'creativity by necessity'.
Social or internet networks are a lot like the brain
the wiring of it (topology) can gives a lot of insight on how it works and can even explain some emerging side effects.
it evolves with time - new connexions are made between nodes everyday, and we observe self-optimization.
the information that is communicated within the network itself is also pretty important. Actually, this is not only the tracer from which we derive its topology and its evolution, but also the very meaning of it.
There is something way too similar about social networks, internet and the brain that really troubles me.
Instead of buying this kind of expenshuge flash card, I am considering Photo Memory Bank from SmartDisk ($549 (40GB); $699 (80GB)) or a Belkin Media Reader for iPod (price $109) - since I already have the iPod.
However, this is still all eggs in one basket - you loose the thing, no pictures left. I guess the ultimate solution is to simply bring a portable with me for my photo expeditions and transfert my pictures on a daily basis on my computer and then either on CD-ROMS or on my web site.
Loosing pictures is not an option for me - these moments almost never come back.
Here is a picture of the moon taken about five minutes ago while it is getting out of the Earch's shadow.
1 sec exposure, f/5.6, ISO 100, 300 mm, with a Canon EOS 10D.
I totally agree - lack of embedded radio is, for me too, a big issue. I also want the ability to directly record radio into MP3 format on the iPod, while listening.
And, while I am at it, why not a short-range embedded FM emitter also to get rid of car wires...
Well, I'll probably buy one anyway...
More than Perseids... Mars too!
on
Perseid Shower
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Actually, more than just the Perseids shower is going on these days. On the 27 of this month, Mars will be closer to our planet than it's been in nearly 60,000 years (read more here)
Note in the image just North of the Yucatan peninsula (South-East of Florida), the strong half-circle anomaly. I've read before that this particular anomaly is probably the signature of the asteroid that hit the Earth 60 millions years ago and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.
About the same time The Matrix (the first one) hit the big screen, there was these two other movies that roughly addressed the reality issue: these movies were Existenz from David Cronenberg and The Thirteenth Floor from Josef Rusnak. It is interesting how these three movies looked at the nature of reality.
What The Matrix did that was missing from the other two movies were the spectacular and highly innovative special effects, of course, but beyong this, I would like to add what others above in this discusison thread are dismissing, the phylosophical question about reality.
This subject is far from new. Platon in his famous Allegory of the Cave were already exploring it.
What the Wachowski brothers did in The Matrix were to re-circulate some of the ideas floating around from ages in a modern action-packed and innovative sci-fi context. And I guess this is why this movie were so popular. The second incarnation of the matrix movie (The Matrix Reloaded) were addressing another issue. The central question were more the meaning of (our individual) existence than the nature of reality. I suspect that the Wachowski brothers will merge these two issues into the same story in Revolutions.
Yup, you need to pay! During the installation procedure, you must select one of the following options:
Annual plan: 79.95
Monthly plan:9.95 per month, first two months free than automatically charged
Narrowband unlimited acces: first month free then 21.95 per month.
Worst, when you are at this page, you can only select one of the presented paying option and continue. There is no turning back (reminds me a marketting strategy...). You can only quit the installation using the X - THEN you are asked if you really want to quit. But even if you quit, it leaves the MSN butterfly icon in the dock.
And God only knows what it did with my admin password!
Writing and reading is almost a given today. But humanity developped many languages and writing systems and most of them are now lost. Actually, every two weeks, a language dies - within the next century, half of the six thousand eight hundred languages on this planet will be dead. When a language dies which has never been recorded in some way, it is as if it has never been. (for more on language death, read this)
There are still many ancient texts, from dead languages, that have never been deciphered, and some, not from such a distant past. Maybe you would like to give your best shot at some of them. Here is a list of texts and writing systems awaiting to be understood:
Rongorongo, the hieroglyphic script of Easter Island
Imaginary Scientist-Creationist dialogue
on
Evolution in Action
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I wonder what would be the next Creationist's intervention in this imaginary dialogue I just created...
What do you think?
Creationist: God created everything 8000 years ago.
Scientist: A lot of evidences indicate that the Universe is a lot older. Astrophysicists and Cosmologist, armed with giant telescopes, estimiate the universe is 13 billion years old. Geologist are saying Earth is about 4.5 billion years. Paleontologists have dinosaurs's bones 200 millions years old. All physical and verifiable evidences prooves you wrong - the universe is older than 8000 years.
Creationnist: God simply created the universe and everything already old and ongoing. Everything have been created 8000 years ago. He created the stars already old, the bones in the rocks, everything.
Scientist: If everything has been created already old like you say, how do you differenciate between the real old (your 8000 years) and the faked old (my 13 billion years)? Since I am sure God did not do any mistake, the faked old is probably perfect. How can you proove then that everything has been created 8000 years ago and why would God deceive us that way?
Creationnist: The real old is 8000 years because it is written in the Bible. It is written that God created the Universe in 6 days. If you add the numbers up (with the generations describe in the Bible and so on), you reach about 8000 years. Why would God do such thing? It is impossible for us to know.
Scientist: Let me use your reasonning. How about this then: God created everything 10 seconds ago. Everything have been created already old and olgoing - our conversation and our memories included. Even the Bible have just been created 10 second ago with the intent to make you believe everything have been created 8000 years ago. The Universe have also been created 10 seconds ago with the intention to make me believe everything has been created 13 billion years ago.
Creationnist: How can you proove this?
Scientist: I can't. In my reasonning, God is perfect and created everything perfectly. There is no difference between the faked and the real. I simply just got a revelation.
You see, the problem with such a reasonning is that everything become arbitrary. We are the puppets of a God that deceives us into believing whatever He wishes so. We can then believe everything we wish (or got 'revealed'). The only common ground become the faked reality, the one where Astrophysicists, Cosmologists, Paleontologists and so on agrees on - 13 billion years Universe. The faked reality then become the only real one...
Actually, if you are interested in the science of networks, I would suggest reading Nexus (by Mark Buchanan) an also Emergence (by Steven Johnson). These two books are a nice introduction to the network effect and the theory of complexity. Of course, there is also the classical Order Out of Chaos (by Prigogine et al (Nobel laureate))
I read those three books back to back (finished Mobs 3 days ago) and, taking these ideas together, you'll see an interesting picture develops.
When I decided to go for the Ph.D., it was not with the perspective of having later on a well-paid job. I did my Ph.D. in astrophysics because I was passionnate. My motivation was to learn, to discover and to better know myself.
I never regretted my choice.
Don't choose a career because it is well paid. Choose it because you like it, because it triggers something in you. Don't sacrifice yourself for money - as a person, you are more important than all the money you will ever have.
Let's establish a monthly pricing model for sending emails.
first 100 are free
next 100 are 1 cent each
next 100 are 10 cents each
next 100 are 100 cents each
...
So, sending 500 spam emails will cost $1111.
Spammers will think twice before sending 10000 emails...
Now who will collect? The ISPs. They know who send emails (who to bill) and how many they send (how much to bill). And I don't care if the government or some internet agency collects from the ISP.
This model does not prevent normal use of emails, but addresses the spammers where it hurt the most.
Actually, considering that pi is infinite, there is a non-null probability that such sequence occurs. It is even pretty sure... infinite concepts being what it is, it contains all probability, even the smallest.
Now, considering that statistically, this 500x500 of 0 and 1 digit span probably do occur, and we would have a statistical explanation for it, swould it be considered as God's signature?
Customer: I need to cross that river. Contractor: OK, let me study your needs, I will come back with a proposal.
some time pass
Contractor: Here it is... you need a bridge. Customer: Oh! Fine. Can you begin constructing it now? I want it for tomorrow 9 o'clock. Here is $500. Contractor: It is impossible! I can't built a bridge for tomorrow! And for $500 dollars! Customer: How come, it is just a bridge! There are plenty of bridges - I looked on the Internet! Here is $100 more. And your competition said he can! Contractor: My competition said he can??? I'll se what I can do.
some time pass
Contractor: Here it is! (showing a fragiler bridge made of ropes) Customer: Nice color. Can I cross it with my car? Contractor: Of course not! Customer: Then it is useless for me! I need to be able to cross it with my car! Contractor: This was not in the specs you gave us (with a wide small) Customer: OK then, can I cross the Atlantic with it? Contractor: You want to cross the Atlantic with a rope bridge? Customer: Do you mean your solution is not scaleable?
Movies are, so far, the most data intensive information products we consume. Books, music and images are a tiny fraction of the data bandwidth a movie (or visual experiment) requires.
So, let's say:
I live 70 years
I watch 5 movies per week (2 hours each)
one hour of high-definition movie is about 2 GB
Then, in my entire life, I will consume something like 70 TB of data. Of course, maybe there will be 3D-surround immersion imaging devices... But eventually, we will be able to store locally all the information we can consume and produce. Storing more will be useless. Eventually, we will reach a point where more and better technology will be useless.
This reminds me something I read a long time ago: Knowledge Crash. Science progresses. It takes more and more time to reach the bleeding edge of science and improve on it. In the beginning of the century, you could write Nobel-prize class papers at 20. Now, you need to be a little bit older. Eventually, to improve on science, you will need a life-long study. And we will reach a point where human life will not be long enough to improve on humanity's knowledge. I know, teaching techniques improves over time, but even then, there will be a limit. The only way out will be a longer human life... or a limitless human life. But until Kurzweil's dream (read this too) become a reality, both technology and knowledge crashes are part of our future - and more technology will not be usefull anymore...
I wonder what kind of society we will live in then... and what being human will mean.:-)
If there is an absence of evidences for the balloon hypothesis, it is not because nobody looked for it. And when researchers are actively and seriously looking for evidences in favor of some hypothesis (I don't have any references for serious efforts in that direction though), and don't find any (as far I know), then I think it is fair to lower the probability of that hypothesis.
But again, don't get me wrong, I don't rule this hypothesis out.
The baloon hypothesis is plausible, but there is a lack of evidences supporting it. No reports whatsoever (oral or written), no drawings of such balloons, no artefacts, no traces (other that the interpretation of the signs).
However, because absence of proof is not a proof of absence, I simply don't rule out this hypothesis, I just put less probability on it.
Slashdot Mirror
- iTunes ringback (what the caller hears is an iTune bought by the callee)
- Distinctive iTune ringtone (I can program the ringtone I hear with an iTune I bought, according to the caller)
- iTunes will not only sync with iPod but also with iPhone
- iPhone to iPhone gifts (I bought an iTune and I give it to you)
- iPhone to iPhone recommendations (I recommend an iTune to you)
- Express your feeling with iTune (when you call her, she hears a music you selected)
- ...
it's just the beginning man! Wait 'till Apple sells movies, documentaries and radio shows...- We need an ontology that will cover many if not all aspect of human experience. And this experience has been evolving dramatically and will continue to evolve. This ontology is probably a moving target. This task alone of creating the ontology has been, and is still the holy grail of AI and Knowledge Management.
- The amount of time we will have to invest in adding metadata to the data will dramatically increase over time. We will need a way to automate the filling of the metadata layer. This is where kicks in automatic image recognition and classification, speech to text, text summarizer and meaning extractor (Here, Copernic is is the right direction). Maybe the librarian profession will be the next hot job...
- Almost every application will have to adapt and inter-communicate. No big deal, RDF will probably become the new data bus anyway.
That will be interesting!!!Within five years, the telco world will have changed.
... It's a disruptive technology.
We will observe a strong fragmentation of the telecommunications world as many small companies will try to get their share of this multi-bilion dollars market. And just because of the low entry cost (look at asterisk, Convedia, Ubiquity, Appium, and many other players way too numerous to list here), you don't have to be a huge company to deliver services in that emerging market of VoIP services (here, by VoIP services, I don't only mean providers, but also secondary services like voice recognition, IVRs, vertical markets services, unified messaging, value-added access resellers, etc.). Maybe after, the market will reconsolidate though.
VoIP is to telco what PC was to computing, what the Amiga Video Toaster was to TV productions, what Napster was to RIAA, what iPod was to MP3 music, what Internet was to information access, what Word, Excel and Powerpoint was to corporations,
It's a fact; those who can't adapt to their changing environment will disappear. And new dominant players will take their place in a new order...
I wonder what my phone (ok, communication device) will look like and will allow me to do in 5 to 10 years from now.
In a network, there are two basic elements: nodes and links.
A social network is the same; there are individual and there are relationships.
What Rheingold is identifying are logical domains within the set of people-relationships elements. In a social network, a domain is an attribute shared by many nodes (individuals). These nodes are then linked in a losely manner so that they don't know they are related, but they are. For example, some people read and react to the same news articles (local, state or national newspaper - participating in corresponding local, state or national trends), the same blogs, the same books, they buy the same technology, they download the same software, the same MP3, they share and exchange ideas and influence without being conscious about it, this is what Rheingold calls "unconscious cooperation". The typical idea of a flock - nobody is driving, but the flock (the logical domain) is acting coherently, without the individual being fully aware of their participation to the group - this reminds me vaguely Theillard de Chardin's Noosphere idea...).
Mobs (the subject of his previous book) is just a subset of this. Nothing really new there, just that he extends his Smart Mobs concept beyong wireless mobility, to other human activities.
I agree. Read Brown Morning (here too) from Frank Pavloff, a very small novel about 10 pages or so. Brilliant and... scary.
I remember using that kind of tactic back then... I was in charge of a research group and we had to produce a huge specification document for friday 17h00. Of course it was not ready on time. So I decided to try something. I first included a few copies of the document (10 or so) in a zip archive, I then encrypted it using PGP, then uuencoded it, performed a shuffling on it and finally zipped-it again and re-PGP it. After removing the heading, I renamed the thing "Spec_1.0.doc" and send it to our customer. Of course we worked all weekend completing the document but at least, it registered, as our contract required, just in time. The customer came back to us one week later saying that they were not able to open the MSWord document. "Oh! (we said), gee! This must be this email thing AGAIN... we've been having this problem lately... let me resend it to you". And I sent the (new, completed and heavily revised) document. The customer were happy because the document were very good, and so were we.
I think this time-dilatation technique has been called 'Ed's relativistic document delivery' in that company I used to work. I just called it 'creativity by necessity'.
- the wiring of it (topology) can gives a lot of insight on how it works and can even explain some emerging side effects.
- it evolves with time - new connexions are made between nodes everyday, and we observe self-optimization.
- the information that is communicated within the network itself is also pretty important. Actually, this is not only the tracer from which we derive its topology and its evolution, but also the very meaning of it.
There is something way too similar about social networks, internet and the brain that really troubles me.Instead of buying this kind of expenshuge flash card, I am considering Photo Memory Bank from SmartDisk ($549 (40GB); $699 (80GB)) or a Belkin Media Reader for iPod (price $109) - since I already have the iPod.
However, this is still all eggs in one basket - you loose the thing, no pictures left. I guess the ultimate solution is to simply bring a portable with me for my photo expeditions and transfert my pictures on a daily basis on my computer and then either on CD-ROMS or on my web site.
Loosing pictures is not an option for me - these moments almost never come back.
Here is a picture of the moon taken about five minutes ago while it is getting out of the Earch's shadow.
1 sec exposure, f/5.6, ISO 100, 300 mm, with a Canon EOS 10D.
I totally agree - lack of embedded radio is, for me too, a big issue. I also want the ability to directly record radio into MP3 format on the iPod, while listening.
And, while I am at it, why not a short-range embedded FM emitter also to get rid of car wires...
Well, I'll probably buy one anyway...
Actually, more than just the Perseids shower is going on these days. On the 27 of this month, Mars will be closer to our planet than it's been in nearly 60,000 years (read more here)
Note in the image just North of the Yucatan peninsula (South-East of Florida), the strong half-circle anomaly. I've read before that this particular anomaly is probably the signature of the asteroid that hit the Earth 60 millions years ago and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.
About the same time The Matrix (the first one) hit the big screen, there was these two other movies that roughly addressed the reality issue: these movies were Existenz from David Cronenberg and The Thirteenth Floor from Josef Rusnak. It is interesting how these three movies looked at the nature of reality.
What The Matrix did that was missing from the other two movies were the spectacular and highly innovative special effects, of course, but beyong this, I would like to add what others above in this discusison thread are dismissing, the phylosophical question about reality.
This subject is far from new. Platon in his famous Allegory of the Cave were already exploring it.
Modern physics is seriously redefining the nature of reality itself with the introduction of probability in Quantum Mechanics (you should read John Gribbin's In Search of Schrodinger's Cat: Quantum Physics and Reality ).
What the Wachowski brothers did in The Matrix were to re-circulate some of the ideas floating around from ages in a modern action-packed and innovative sci-fi context. And I guess this is why this movie were so popular. The second incarnation of the matrix movie (The Matrix Reloaded) were addressing another issue. The central question were more the meaning of (our individual) existence than the nature of reality. I suspect that the Wachowski brothers will merge these two issues into the same story in Revolutions.
Annual plan: 79.95
Monthly plan :9.95 per month, first two months free than automatically charged
Narrowband unlimited acces: first month free then 21.95 per month.
Worst, when you are at this page, you can only select one of the presented paying option and continue. There is no turning back (reminds me a marketting strategy...). You can only quit the installation using the X - THEN you are asked if you really want to quit. But even if you quit, it leaves the MSN butterfly icon in the dock.
And God only knows what it did with my admin password!
There are still many ancient texts, from dead languages, that have never been deciphered, and some, not from such a distant past. Maybe you would like to give your best shot at some of them. Here is a list of texts and writing systems awaiting to be understood:
Rongorongo, the hieroglyphic script of Easter Island
The Voynich Manuscript, 200 pages, probably written in the 13 century
Indus Valley scripts from Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, 4000 years ago
Etruscan
The Disc of Phaistos, from Crete, 3700 years ago
Meroitic hieroglyphs of ancient Nubia
Zapotec script
Have fun!
What do you think?
Actually, if you are interested in the science of networks, I would suggest reading Nexus (by Mark Buchanan) an also Emergence (by Steven Johnson). These two books are a nice introduction to the network effect and the theory of complexity. Of course, there is also the classical Order Out of Chaos (by Prigogine et al (Nobel laureate))
I read those three books back to back (finished Mobs 3 days ago) and, taking these ideas together, you'll see an interesting picture develops.
When I decided to go for the Ph.D., it was not with the perspective of having later on a well-paid job. I did my Ph.D. in astrophysics because I was passionnate. My motivation was to learn, to discover and to better know myself.
:-)
I never regretted my choice.
Don't choose a career because it is well paid. Choose it because you like it, because it triggers something in you. Don't sacrifice yourself for money - as a person, you are more important than all the money you will ever have.
Well, just my two cents.
first 100 are free
next 100 are 1 cent each
next 100 are 10 cents each
next 100 are 100 cents each
... So, sending 500 spam emails will cost $1111.
Spammers will think twice before sending 10000 emails...
Now who will collect? The ISPs. They know who send emails (who to bill) and how many they send (how much to bill). And I don't care if the government or some internet agency collects from the ISP.
This model does not prevent normal use of emails, but addresses the spammers where it hurt the most.
Actually, considering that pi is infinite, there is a non-null probability that such sequence occurs. It is even pretty sure... infinite concepts being what it is, it contains all probability, even the smallest.
Now, considering that statistically, this 500x500 of 0 and 1 digit span probably do occur, and we would have a statistical explanation for it, swould it be considered as God's signature?
Customer: I need to cross that river.
Contractor: OK, let me study your needs, I will come back with a proposal.
some time pass
Contractor: Here it is... you need a bridge.
Customer: Oh! Fine. Can you begin constructing it now? I want it for tomorrow 9 o'clock. Here is $500.
Contractor: It is impossible! I can't built a bridge for tomorrow! And for $500 dollars!
Customer: How come, it is just a bridge! There are plenty of bridges - I looked on the Internet! Here is $100 more. And your competition said he can!
Contractor: My competition said he can??? I'll se what I can do.
some time pass
Contractor: Here it is! (showing a fragiler bridge made of ropes)
Customer: Nice color. Can I cross it with my car?
Contractor: Of course not!
Customer: Then it is useless for me! I need to be able to cross it with my car!
Contractor: This was not in the specs you gave us (with a wide small)
Customer: OK then, can I cross the Atlantic with it?
Contractor: You want to cross the Atlantic with a rope bridge?
Customer: Do you mean your solution is not scaleable?
and so it goes, and so it goes...
Have a look at dotmac's Sherlock Channel. It is very well done, as for the entire site by the way.
:-)
And while you are there, go see my pictures...
So, let's say:
I live 70 years
I watch 5 movies per week (2 hours each)
one hour of high-definition movie is about 2 GB Then, in my entire life, I will consume something like 70 TB of data. Of course, maybe there will be 3D-surround immersion imaging devices... But eventually, we will be able to store locally all the information we can consume and produce. Storing more will be useless. Eventually, we will reach a point where more and better technology will be useless.
:-)
This reminds me something I read a long time ago: Knowledge Crash. Science progresses. It takes more and more time to reach the bleeding edge of science and improve on it. In the beginning of the century, you could write Nobel-prize class papers at 20. Now, you need to be a little bit older. Eventually, to improve on science, you will need a life-long study. And we will reach a point where human life will not be long enough to improve on humanity's knowledge. I know, teaching techniques improves over time, but even then, there will be a limit. The only way out will be a longer human life... or a limitless human life. But until Kurzweil's dream (read this too) become a reality, both technology and knowledge crashes are part of our future - and more technology will not be usefull anymore...
I wonder what kind of society we will live in then... and what being human will mean.
If there is an absence of evidences for the balloon hypothesis, it is not because nobody looked for it. And when researchers are actively and seriously looking for evidences in favor of some hypothesis (I don't have any references for serious efforts in that direction though), and don't find any (as far I know), then I think it is fair to lower the probability of that hypothesis.
But again, don't get me wrong, I don't rule this hypothesis out.
The baloon hypothesis is plausible, but there is a lack of evidences supporting it. No reports whatsoever (oral or written), no drawings of such balloons, no artefacts, no traces (other that the interpretation of the signs).
However, because absence of proof is not a proof of absence, I simply don't rule out this hypothesis, I just put less probability on it.