Like many academics, he has founded a company. It hardly invalidates his research. They aren't trying to hide it either - one of the other authors is contributing in his capacity as a StreamBase employee, as shown right at the top of the paper.
Also, since nobody else has said anything about his neutrality or otherwise, you shouldn't put the word "neutral" in quotes like that. It makes you look like you are trying to set up a straw man. Neutrality is not even particularly important in a researcher. You'd have to go a long way to find one who didn't want his own particular theory to prevail, whatever the reason. Peer review of the content is the criterion on which papers are judged.
The whole point of the story is that someone actually fell for the ancient joke.. I've seen the 127.0.0.1 gag a million times here on slashdot, but I still laughed out loud at this, because it looks like someone was stupid enough to actually fall for it.
Of course, the story could be a hoax, but that's not obviously the case, and would be a very different thing from the story being boring because it's repeating an old joke.
Not having personally communicated with a script kiddy, it entertains me greatly to think that some of them might be so utterly braindead as to fall for the 127.0.0.1 gag.
Ocular dominance columns form by competition between signals from each eye. If there is no visual input during the period when this process takes place, the animal remains blind for life. This is a blindness not of the eye, but of the visual cortex. See here for example. The research won Hubel and Wiesel a Nobel prize in 1981.
This is slashdot, not a university. Instead of peremptorily demanding proof, references, empirical data and analysis, why don't you do the googling yourself?
Heard it all before. It's so boring it's hard to summon the effort to argue with it, but here goes.
Firstly, unlike the UNIX vendors and Microsoft, open source software isn't a company, so the words "succeed", "fail" and "compete" don't have the meanings the author thinks they do in this context. The author is comparing open source development to the UNIX wars, but the UNIX wars were a winner-takes all battle between COMPANIES, many of which went out of business. Open source isn't.
The fact that a bunch of programmers (or wannabees) in one place are arguing about whether there should be 3D widgets doesn't mean that all of linux development grinds to a halt. This is a common misconception. Certainly there are arguments and turf wars, and GUIs can be particularly contentious, but the bickering you see in forums is just that: bickering in forums. The fact that people like to argue about KDE and GNOME on Slashdot hasn't prevented both of them from steadily improving. Since there is no requirement to continuously make money and since the code is GPLd so it can't just disappear, that steady development will continue.
It's very true that there is much fragmentation, and many different flavours, and that this is all a bit bewildering. I even agree that this is a downside of open source, but I have yet to see a single shred of evidence that this flaw is fatal, and it often isn't even a flaw at all. For example, the author whinges about the differences in installation packaging. Personally, I think the fact that package management is considered to be a defining feature of a distribution, and that people are still actively coming up with new ways to solve the problem is absolutely excellent. None of the current solutions are perfect, but they are getting better. Having wrestled with Windows Installer, it is a subject dear to my heart, and it is one that Microsoft most certainly haven't come close to solving. Why should we stick with one botched solution just so we can "compete" against Microsoft. If there is a market for shitty installers, they're welcome to it.
For that matter, why are we supposed to give a shit if we put Sun out of business? I think that snarky comment more than any other belies the true motivation behind this screed. I think it goes as follows:
The author is a UNIX man
Linux is on course to replace UNIX
The author hates Microsoft
The author doesn't think Linux can "beat" microsoft, so he thinks his way of life is going to disappear in a puff of smoke.
Boo-hoo. Personally, I disagree entirely with his contention that with microsoft are going to somehow magically make Linux disappear because he's analysing it as if it were some 1980s UNIX vender called "LinuxCorp". Regardless of that, though, it isn't Linux's job to provide what he wants which is to rewind history, bash some heads together and have UNIX beat windows. That simply isn't what Linux is about.
I fucking LOVE the British climate. Then again, I'm the kind of person who likes a bit of variety in life, so I consider the fact it isn't sunny all year round to be an advantage.
I happen to think that frosty mornings are the best mornings, that plenty of rain is essential for maintaining a lush, green landscape, that fog and snow are atmospheric and that two or three months of scorching hot weather a year are plenty. The only weather that pisses me off is wind, but since I've given up smoking, it doesn't bother me so much. (I used to roll my own)
The British countryside is beautiful all year round, because of the climate. It just wouldn't appeal to someone who's idea of heaven is getting sunburn in the middle of winter.
Wales is part of the United Kingom. If you were born in the UK before 1983, you are British. (There are some extra requirements if you were born after 1983.)
Perhaps I wasn't clear. My point wasn't that you couldn't discriminate between "statistical inference, pattern recognition, classification and the rest", but that it was hard to draw a line between AI and each of these, as AI involves at least elements of all of them.
You're absolutely right that these areas of mathematics are well defined. It's artificial intelligence that's poorly defined, which is inevitable because intelligence is poorly defined.
... are intricately related. Many AI techniques are forms of statistical inference or statistical classification techniques. Some neural nets implement grouping techniques not that different from k-means.
Any box which learns from a set of data in order to predict future data by implicitly extracting trends and patterns from that data is an implementation of some form of statistical inference algorithm and is subject to all of the general results statistics has to offer about such algorithms. Conversely, statistical inference algorithms are often implemented in ways associated with AI, for example as neural nets.
Given this situation, it's hard to define the boundaries that separate artificial intelligence, pattern recognition, statistical inference and classification and the rest. Of course, there is a legitimate question as to whether such techniques actually mimic genuine intelligence even in principle, and there are other approaches.
From the point of view of terminology, there is a huge range of techniques that can be called AI, and statistical inference is one of them. If you call a VLSI neural network implementing a statistical inference algorithm "AI", then why not call a normal computer implementing a statistical inference algorithm "AI"? Besides, AI sounds a hell of a lot sexier than statistics when you're trying to extract maximum dough from the ample coffers of the recording industry.
Then please explain what it has to do with the USL/BSD settlement.
This is a pretty important event and, since I'm temporarily unable to reach Groklaw I came over to see the discussion on Slashdot, only to find there's barely a single meaningful comment about the article. There's just a huge discussion that looks like it's been cut-and-pasted from the replies to a kuro5hin article called "GWB's big stupid monkey face" or something. Piss-poor show, even for Slashdot.
Seems like the first time years I've actually seen the offtopic mod used properly.
I used to be into astronomy when I was a kid, in a sightseeing, rather than scientific interest kind of way. Sorry for the negative comment, but while there are many beautiful things to see in the sky, but I don't quite see how conjunctions qualify.
Through a decent telescope, the planets themselves are certainly pretty, and there would be some limited fun in being able to see two at the same time. With the naked eye or binoculars though, it sounds as though you could create an equally "beautiful" sight by punching two pinholes in a piece of black paper and holding it up to a lightbulb.
I don't mean to rain on anyone's parade, but it takes more than a conjunction to get me staring upwards, awestruck at the glory of creation.
Do these events have any particular scientific value?
Slashdot Mirror
Like many academics, he has founded a company. It hardly invalidates his research. They aren't trying to hide it either - one of the other authors is contributing in his capacity as a StreamBase employee, as shown right at the top of the paper.
Also, since nobody else has said anything about his neutrality or otherwise, you shouldn't put the word "neutral" in quotes like that. It makes you look like you are trying to set up a straw man. Neutrality is not even particularly important in a researcher. You'd have to go a long way to find one who didn't want his own particular theory to prevail, whatever the reason. Peer review of the content is the criterion on which papers are judged.
I think if they have the signal too high in good conditions, the base stations start interfering with each other.
What's a person with multiple degrees in "Thermodynamics, chemistry and electrical engineering" doing installing water heaters for a living?
Terry Gilliam is American, despite being a Python.
Best jargon ever! It's begging to be made an SF title.
The whole point of the story is that someone actually fell for the ancient joke.. I've seen the 127.0.0.1 gag a million times here on slashdot, but I still laughed out loud at this, because it looks like someone was stupid enough to actually fall for it.
Of course, the story could be a hoax, but that's not obviously the case, and would be a very different thing from the story being boring because it's repeating an old joke.
Not having personally communicated with a script kiddy, it entertains me greatly to think that some of them might be so utterly braindead as to fall for the 127.0.0.1 gag.
+1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Funny
Endemic. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Ocular dominance columns form by competition between signals from each eye. If there is no visual input during the period when this process takes place, the animal remains blind for life. This is a blindness not of the eye, but of the visual cortex. See here for example. The research won Hubel and Wiesel a Nobel prize in 1981.
This is slashdot, not a university. Instead of peremptorily demanding proof, references, empirical data and analysis, why don't you do the googling yourself?
Does he beat your mum when he gets home?
Wankers?
Heard it all before. It's so boring it's hard to summon the effort to argue with it, but here goes.
Firstly, unlike the UNIX vendors and Microsoft, open source software isn't a company, so the words "succeed", "fail" and "compete" don't have the meanings the author thinks they do in this context. The author is comparing open source development to the UNIX wars, but the UNIX wars were a winner-takes all battle between COMPANIES, many of which went out of business. Open source isn't.
The fact that a bunch of programmers (or wannabees) in one place are arguing about whether there should be 3D widgets doesn't mean that all of linux development grinds to a halt. This is a common misconception. Certainly there are arguments and turf wars, and GUIs can be particularly contentious, but the bickering you see in forums is just that: bickering in forums. The fact that people like to argue about KDE and GNOME on Slashdot hasn't prevented both of them from steadily improving. Since there is no requirement to continuously make money and since the code is GPLd so it can't just disappear, that steady development will continue.
It's very true that there is much fragmentation, and many different flavours, and that this is all a bit bewildering. I even agree that this is a downside of open source, but I have yet to see a single shred of evidence that this flaw is fatal, and it often isn't even a flaw at all. For example, the author whinges about the differences in installation packaging. Personally, I think the fact that package management is considered to be a defining feature of a distribution, and that people are still actively coming up with new ways to solve the problem is absolutely excellent. None of the current solutions are perfect, but they are getting better. Having wrestled with Windows Installer, it is a subject dear to my heart, and it is one that Microsoft most certainly haven't come close to solving. Why should we stick with one botched solution just so we can "compete" against Microsoft. If there is a market for shitty installers, they're welcome to it.
For that matter, why are we supposed to give a shit if we put Sun out of business? I think that snarky comment more than any other belies the true motivation behind this screed. I think it goes as follows:
Boo-hoo. Personally, I disagree entirely with his contention that with microsoft are going to somehow magically make Linux disappear because he's analysing it as if it were some 1980s UNIX vender called "LinuxCorp". Regardless of that, though, it isn't Linux's job to provide what he wants which is to rewind history, bash some heads together and have UNIX beat windows. That simply isn't what Linux is about.
I fucking LOVE the British climate. Then again, I'm the kind of person who likes a bit of variety in life, so I consider the fact it isn't sunny all year round to be an advantage.
I happen to think that frosty mornings are the best mornings, that plenty of rain is essential for maintaining a lush, green landscape, that fog and snow are atmospheric and that two or three months of scorching hot weather a year are plenty. The only weather that pisses me off is wind, but since I've given up smoking, it doesn't bother me so much. (I used to roll my own)
The British countryside is beautiful all year round, because of the climate. It just wouldn't appeal to someone who's idea of heaven is getting sunburn in the middle of winter.
Wales is part of the United Kingom. If you were born in the UK before 1983, you are British. (There are some extra requirements if you were born after 1983.)
It sure had jumped the shark, anyway. The last couple of weeks in particular have had some seriously lame strips. It's a shame. I'm going to miss it.
Perhaps I wasn't clear. My point wasn't that you couldn't discriminate between "statistical inference, pattern recognition, classification and the rest", but that it was hard to draw a line between AI and each of these, as AI involves at least elements of all of them.
You're absolutely right that these areas of mathematics are well defined. It's artificial intelligence that's poorly defined, which is inevitable because intelligence is poorly defined.
... are intricately related. Many AI techniques are forms of statistical inference or statistical classification techniques. Some neural nets implement grouping techniques not that different from k-means.
Any box which learns from a set of data in order to predict future data by implicitly extracting trends and patterns from that data is an implementation of some form of statistical inference algorithm and is subject to all of the general results statistics has to offer about such algorithms. Conversely, statistical inference algorithms are often implemented in ways associated with AI, for example as neural nets.
Given this situation, it's hard to define the boundaries that separate artificial intelligence, pattern recognition, statistical inference and classification and the rest. Of course, there is a legitimate question as to whether such techniques actually mimic genuine intelligence even in principle, and there are other approaches.
From the point of view of terminology, there is a huge range of techniques that can be called AI, and statistical inference is one of them. If you call a VLSI neural network implementing a statistical inference algorithm "AI", then why not call a normal computer implementing a statistical inference algorithm "AI"? Besides, AI sounds a hell of a lot sexier than statistics when you're trying to extract maximum dough from the ample coffers of the recording industry.
Man, you've got some strange sexual tastes.
I'm using Windows 2000, Fifefox 1.0 and Internet Explorer 6. www.bbcurdu.com looks the same in IE and Firefox 1.0. The font used is identical.
He was asking for it.
Then please explain what it has to do with the USL/BSD settlement.
This is a pretty important event and, since I'm temporarily unable to reach Groklaw I came over to see the discussion on Slashdot, only to find there's barely a single meaningful comment about the article. There's just a huge discussion that looks like it's been cut-and-pasted from the replies to a kuro5hin article called "GWB's big stupid monkey face" or something. Piss-poor show, even for Slashdot.
Seems like the first time years I've actually seen the offtopic mod used properly.
As they realise that:
Oops!
That is one surreal image. Any particular reason for thinking that?
BTW, whoever modded you down as "overrated" when you hadn't even been modded yet is a cunt of the highest order.
I used to be into astronomy when I was a kid, in a sightseeing, rather than scientific interest kind of way. Sorry for the negative comment, but while there are many beautiful things to see in the sky, but I don't quite see how conjunctions qualify.
Through a decent telescope, the planets themselves are certainly pretty, and there would be some limited fun in being able to see two at the same time. With the naked eye or binoculars though, it sounds as though you could create an equally "beautiful" sight by punching two pinholes in a piece of black paper and holding it up to a lightbulb.
I don't mean to rain on anyone's parade, but it takes more than a conjunction to get me staring upwards, awestruck at the glory of creation.
Do these events have any particular scientific value?
Java