But why are we okay with being sad at the computer?
I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
61–70 of 87 posts
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#62That’s awesome! Thanks for sharing. Makes me want to play around with these libraries.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#63Does anyone else find this mildly dystopian? I mean, it's a cool and really fun project, but it doesn't take much imagination to envision a service like this actually taking off. "We monitor your mood 24/7 and automatically send you 'happy thoughts' on demand! Contemplating your feelings? Why bother! Here's a cute cat video! Never feel uncomfortable, pensive, or existential again!"
The dystopia is already upon us. Facial recognition was apparently deployed in a school in China to track students' emotions and actions. [0]. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/china-school-facial-recognit...
Was done in (NZ) Auckland University too if I recall correctly.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
This was a scene in the movie Don't Look Up. A cellphone company CEO (a Zukerburg type character) introduces the 9.5 update, which includes emotion sensors. When you are sad, it automatically shows you pictures of cats. So yes, I do. Edit: Here is the video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jTHBBkillM&t=96s (My bad it was the 14.3 update and dogs riding chickens)
Another exploration of this theme was in an episode of Doctor Who (Smile) which features a colony with nanobots that are optimized for happiness, with disastrous results: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smile_(Doctor_Who) - "The Vardy were programmed to help construct and operate the colony and make the colonists happy, monitoring the emotional state of the colonists through the emotion badges and avatars. When one of…
Huh, I was going to wonder if this inspired the AI safety concept about how you shouldn't program a superintelligent AI to optimize the number of things it can see that look like human smiles, since unfortunately there are many ways to maximize that other than making real people genuinely happy.
But it seems like the Doctor Who episode is from 2017 and so it could potentially have been inspired the other way around.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#65I solved this problem in a lower-tech way by simply configuring the area behind my workstation as a cat bed. Now, I can turn around and enjoy looking at my cat at any time, as she loves her bed and rarely leaves it. Stress eliminated! Yes, she is taking Series A funding in the form of wet food, if anyone is interested.
There is a wide gap between my screens and keyboard. Enough for 2 out of my 4 cats to accommodate themselves.
At first, I thought it was for me, they did it to keep me happy, but then quickly realized they somehow can understand when it's chow time and simply get up, start stretching and sit up in front of my screen around that time.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#66This is fine for when you are a little down. It’s important though to honor real sadness vs trying to cover it up / distract.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#67Now this sounds like fun, when Peter Isherwell [0] proposed it, it was a bit more scary.
[0]: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt11286314/characters/nm0753314
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#68Would be interesting to use this to track your facial emotion in relation to what you are doing at your computer; e.g. facebooking, reading news, working, etc. If you're a developer, what kind of programming you're doing, language, platform, etc. Could scientifically prove once and for all whether or not Ruby is optimized for programmer happiness.
You can use ActivityWatch to gather the data.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#69I solved this problem in a lower-tech way by simply configuring the area behind my workstation as a cat bed. Now, I can turn around and enjoy looking at my cat at any time, as she loves her bed and rarely leaves it. Stress eliminated! Yes, she is taking Series A funding in the form of wet food, if anyone is interested.
Isn't any warm spot essentially pre-configured as a cat bed?
Any place is pre-configured as a cat bed. "If I fits, I sits" does not just apply to boxes... cats will, in my experience, sit wherever the f..k they want whenever the f..k they want.
Re: I wrote a program that sends cats to my phone when I'm sad at the computer
#70Maker of the Cat API the author uses here - love his use-case, and a wonderfully useful & concise write-up to boot.
How do you moderate what is uploaded and check for copyright for example. I am always confused how solo developers make sure that nothing malicious is uploaded.
Surely you don't have time to moderate everything yourself.