I posted a doomsday picture of what the end of net neutrality would look like several months ago. Here’s that image: This image caused some panic in a recent D&D thread. I have felt somewhat guilty about posting such a sensationalist photoshop since it has no real basis in reality, and so I felt obliged to clarify why the image is so troubling. That particular model is unmarketable, not because the basic concept is unmarketable, but because we are already so used to having those basic services (YouTube, Blogger, MySpace, etc) that the consuming public wouldn’t stand for their sudden removal from the web. Those services would necessarily be turned into the internet equivalent of ‘basic cable’, like the weather channel or CSPAN. While that particular depiction is unlikely, the basic concept is extremely marketable. It is already how TV (and telephone services) operate, and consumers are used to paying for tiered services. That’s why the image is so uncanny and disturbing, because it is already so familiar. But there is a HUGE difference between a tiered internet offering a YouTubeHD premium package, and a cable service offering tiered TV packages. With TV, content is produced by a network or a consolidated media company, so you get high quality productions that cost a lot of money. To offset those costs, the companies strike deals with cable TV providers to offer their content at certain prices. In other words, the TV providers work in conjunction with the content providers, and this necessarily homogenizes and narrows the scope of media offered. On the internet, on the other hand, there are no centralized sources of content production. There are no networks or media companies that have control of the market. Existing media companies have to compete with small start-up companies, and the existing […]

or: the extended mind for the blind Head-mounted device is the cat’s whiskers

From What the Sopranos taught me about technology: During one of his therapy sessions with Dr. Jennifer Melfi, Tony shares with her that he is flummoxed at A.J.’s behavior of late. She says it sounds like his son has discovered existentialism, to which Tony replies: “[!@%$#%@] Internet.” But Melfi defends the ‘Net, assuring him that existentialism is a European philosophy that was around long before the Web. I really want to do something similar with Dr Katz, but I just haven’t had time to do the video editing.

Jon called me out to celebrate Google’s birthday a few days ago. It wasn’t really Google’s birthday, it was more like its christening; it has been 10 years since www.google.com was registered. I posted the following response, which might not be what he expected, but I thougt was worth posting here. I should start by saying that I like the Google example, not because I think it is the pinnacle of what search should be, but simply because it is an intelligent machine that we interact with every day and don’t give it a second thought. Philosophers like these kinds of ‘its right in front of your nose!’ examples. But the problem of search is much bigger than just Google. One of my profs really wants me to use Searchlight as my core example, but I will always be a PC guy (even if Vista sucks). In any case, it might be instructive in this context to compare Google to other search engines. Take Powerset, for example. The NYT recently had a post\ on how Powerset is attempting to use some fancy natural language processing techniques that came out of Xerox PARC to beat Google at its own game. I’ve often argued that Google is a language user, but Powerlabs is exactly right to assert that Google doesn’t use natural language; it isn’t a user like us. But how much does that matter? My initial reaction is that Powerlabs shouldn’t pretend it is in competition with Google (even if it wants a share of Google’s market); it is really serving a different kind of function. There are certain kinds of questions that Google is bad at answering because of its inability to understand natural language, but there are other kinds of questions that I really just want a machine to […]

In case you were wondering: The Technomancer Like druids, but with tech instead of nature. Technomancers are more than just skilled technicians. They are in tune with machines, connecting with them not only on an intellectual but a spiritual level. Note: A “machine”, for purposes of the technomancer, is any electronic system. A technomancer does not necessarily have any mechanical or structural engineering abilities or knowledge. But “electrical and electronic systems, computers, and artificial intelligences” is one hell of an awkward phrase. … Robotic Companion: A 1st-level technomancer may begin play with a robotic companion. This companion is one that the technomancer has built herself. Robotic companions can have up to 2 HD. Alternatively, the technomancer may have more than one robotic companion provided that the robots’ total HD don’t exceed 2. The technomancer can also cast AI friendship on other robots during play (see the spell description below.) I’m looking for a word to describe someone almost religiously devoted to technology, but I’d prefer a word that leans towards cyberpunk and away from D&D. I don’t like technomancer, and technomage is just as bad. I like server monk, but it wouldn’t make much sense to someone who didn’t know server. Technopriest is taken by the Catholics, and electroyogi and eVicar are just silly. So help me out, cyberspace.

From this collection, most of which is send ups or variations of rather tired internet memes. See also.

In an airport smoking lounge, two TSA officials take a smoke break with Sudoku books in hand. TSA 1: You know its just logic. If a computer had that puzzle, it could solve it in [pause] ten seconds. Just… poof [makes wild hand gestures]. TSA 2: Well, obviously I’m not a computer. [pause, smiles] If I were a computer, I’d have a real job.

So in the D&D thread on the Deep Blue article, I was getting a bit liberal with my misanthropist technophile rhetorical flourishes. This particular response makes me chuckle a bit: Not to attack you or anything, but you get overly dramatic over bizarre stuff. What do you mean by “This comparatively simple inert machine generated genuine panic and emotion in humanity’s best representative; in the face of the machine, we flinched first” exactly? It seems like you’re turning the frustration of one person into a species-wide defeat that we all felt — and on top of it, you really seem to relish it. It seems odd to me that you simultaneously place such great significance upon machines performing the tasks they were built to perform and such great satisfaction in humans “losing.” After I gave my colloquium on Friday, there was some discussion about how my intuitions concerning machines and technology didn’t align with most people at the talk. A certain Mr. Swenson suggested, via an illusion to Jane Goodall, that perhaps I had spent so much time around machines that I actually started to think like them . Well, if loving machines is wrong then I don’t wanna be right.

Its a few months late, but happy 10 year anniversary to Deep Blue vs Kasparov! To commemorate the event, Dennett wrote up a short, and I think painfully superficial, discussion in MIT’s Technology Review. Higher Games The verdict that computers are the equal of human beings in chess could hardly be more official, which makes the caviling all the more pathetic. The excuses sometimes take this form: “Yes, but machines don’t play chess the way human beings play chess!” Or sometimes this: “What the machines do isn’t really playing chess at all.” Well, then, what would be really playing chess? This is not a trivial question. The best computer chess is well nigh indistinguishable from the best human chess, except for one thing: computers don’t know when to accept a draw. Computers–at least currently existing computers–can’t be bored or embarrassed, or anxious about losing the respect of the other players, and these are aspects of life that human competitors always have to contend with, and sometimes even exploit, in their games. Offering or accepting a draw, or resigning, is the one decision that opens the hermetically sealed world of chess to the real world, in which life is short and there are things more important than chess to think about. This boundary crossing can be simulated with an arbitrary rule, or by allowing the computer’s handlers to step in. Human players often try to intimidate or embarrass their human opponents, but this is like the covert pushing and shoving that goes on in soccer matches. The imperviousness of computers to this sort of gamesmanship means that if you beat them at all, you have to beat them fair and square–and isn’t that just what ­Kasparov and Kramnik were unable to do? |via Reality Apologetics| I am personally convinced that humanity […]