Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

shkspr.mobi

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

631–640 of 700 posts

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#631

Post by Closi »

matchbok wrote: post #553
sandworm101 wrote: post #525

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>There's a big question on whether these approaches work well for onboarding the next billion users to the internet That isn't what captchas are used for. There are two side to every captcha, what the website is using them for and what the captcha creator or provider is using them for. In google's case, captchas are being used to hone AI. So it is no wonder that items like hydrants, store fronts, crosswalks and traf…

Google no longer uses captcha to hone their AI.

This seems unlikely considering all the captcha’s are still image classification problems related to driving.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#632

Post by Normille »

curryst wrote: post #427
Normille wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another one that I've seen on reCraptchas is "Boardwalk". If it had not been for the song "Under the boardwalk" I'd have had no idea what that was referring to. We call it a "Pier" round these parts. Taking Crosswalk as a reference, Boardwalk sounds like it should therefore refer to a place where you walk on some boards... such as where there are roadworks... or a wooden bridge... or outside the saloon in a Western.

In fairness, I don't think this is well known in the US. My impression was always that a boardwalk is just a pier that no longer has any use for naval stuff, so they built a carnival on it. Pier is a more familiar term to me. I think I've only heard the term boardwalk in relation to some place in New Jersey.

Hmmm... "Pier" doesn't really have any naval connotations in Uk English. Somewhere ships [naval or otherwise] tie up would be a "Jetty". A pier would usually suggest what you're describing as a 'boardwalk' -- found in a seaside town, with cafés, amusements and other entertainments on it and lots of people strolling about eating ice cream.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#633

Post by Normille »

saurik wrote: post #288
Normille wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or just leave that website. Why should you be subjected to torment for the privilege of boosting some website's visitor numbers? Imagine if, every time you went to the supermarket or the library, there was some goon on the door who wouldn't let you in unless you could do ten press-ups and answer half a dozen general knowledge questions. They'd soon go out of business --as all websites which treat their visitors with…

Sadly, while it is extremely rare that a supermarket offers a product differentiated on anything but location, the same is not true of websites: not going through the CAPTCHA means I don't get to see the content I wanted or needed to see; I can't just drive five minutes further to get the same content from someone without a CAPTCHA. This thereby isn't a functional market and so market economics can't help us: this re…

There's very little content on the Internet that isn't available from a variety of different sources. It's very rare to find something completely original and unique to only one site.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#634

Post by billforsternz »

tremon wrote: post #570
alias_neo wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not American, and I agree there is a lot of information there, but it seems reasonably sane if you read through it. I don't see any obvious contradictions. You can't park 11-1 tuesday due to street cleaning. You can't stop there mon-fri 7:30-16:00 with the exception of 7:30-8 for school business (dropping the kids off). You can park mon-fri between 4 and 6, once per day, per district (to pick up your kids after s…

it seems reasonably sane if you read through it. It doesn't matter if it seems sane that way. How many seconds does a driver have to read through that all when he's driving near the speed limit? Do we expect drivers to still keep an eye on the road while trying to decipher it? Do we expect every driver to slam on the brakes, and stand still until they've parsed it all?

I think the idea is you stop, read the sign (probably need to get out of the car), then either stay or go after parsing. Or if you're a regular you learn the rules that apply to you.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#635

Post by hadrien01 »

DominikPeters wrote: post #612
lordnacho wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I rented a car there and I was amazed at how much text there was, instead of symbols. Eg they have signs in turning lanes that say "Right lane must turn right". By the time you've read that, you've turned right.

Wikipedia is interesting on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_signs_in_the_United_State... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manual_on_Uniform_Traffic_Cont...

There's also a comparison between English-speaking countries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_traffic_signs_in...

I find it interesting how the US uses text for almost everything, and how Canada is sort of a mix of US-style and European-style signs.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#637

Post by billforsternz »

altitudinous wrote: post #395

Yes, the American focus of the internet is absolutely appalling. Assumptions of timezones - PST, CST and the others whatever they are. Northern hemisphere assumptions of seasons - fall, etc - in the southern hemisphere the seasons are the opposite and we don't use the word fall. Even Apple, known for its "sensitivity" to cultural matters has a big miss on this one.

I just had a (probably stupid, but never mind) idea. Abolish time zones. Universal time everywhere in the world. 6 "hours" called red, green, blue, yellow, white and black. 100 minutes in an "hour", 144 seconds in a "minute". Night and day are different colours in different countries but so what? Someone would have to write a brand new "Falsehoods programmers believe about time" though.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#638

Post by jpambrun »

hinkley wrote: post #551
jpambrun wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You obviously never lived in cold climates. Everything outside my winters clothes is at outside temperature (inside is often not terribly hot either..). I am not about to carry my laptop in my coat, which are usually a somewhat tight fit.

“Yes, obviously,” he responded, sarcastically. Anyone who has bought hot food on a cold day has an opportunity to learn about how some containers do nothing and others do quite a bit. Even thin paper versus heavy brown paper makes a pretty big difference in insulation. Many bags designed for laptops have open cell foam for shock resistance, and thermally conductive foam is a specialty item. You practically can’t make…

If a device requires some special enclosure to work in the climate it's intended to be used it should come with it. People would find their MacBook Air a lot less appealing if it came with a mandatory carrying case. This is not on the consumer to fix.

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#639

Post by GFischer »

ape4 wrote: post #467
dayve wrote: post #247

Being an African born & bred in Nigeria, I particularly find this appalling. Captcha usually asks users to identify fire hydrants, crosswalks & other objects with design patterns that are not common here, in everyday living. There's a big question on whether these approaches work well for onboarding the next billion users to the internet, especially since the demographics are much different from existing internet use…

I'd love to try some non-American captchas ;)

I wonder how many people in the U.S. would recognize what is instantly familiar to us in Uruguay, the Yerba Mate gourd (10 out of 10 Uruguayans would recognize)

https://www.123rf.com/photo_120278916_stock-vector-yerba-mat...

Re: CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

#640

Post by fuzxi »

recursive wrote: post #593
93po wrote: post #545

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use a password generator for the answers and save them in my password manager. One time I had to read 20 random characters to someone on the phone as a response to my favorite food

So... why not just use your password manager to record the account's actual password, so you don't need to use security questions?

A lot of sites require security questions (think banks and healthcare services).
Post reply on HN