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Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

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Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#301

Post by appplication »

john_strinlai wrote: post #300
appplication wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, I have some weirdly relevant direct experience to share here. Pokémon Go was released at the beginning of July 2016. A week later, the Air Force kicked off its Red Flag exercise in Nellis AFB outside of Vegas. For the several thousand active duty folks participating, this is a month-long TDY from their normal base to Vegas. The premise is a large-scale war simulation, and it encompasses essentially all…

military folk love their acronyms! i had no idea what "TDY" was. for others like me who may not know their military acronyms: AFB = air force base TDY = temporary duty SCIF = sensitive compartmented information facility OPSEC = operational security

Ha certainly, and thank you for translating! Weirdly my first experience with the term TDY came from an internship at the Red Cross, where I showed up and they informed me my manager would be gone for the entirety of my internship “on TDY”. I had no idea what I meant, until months later I learned she was on maternity leave. I’ve never heard it used that way since, but it’s always stuck with me.

In the military it’s basically whenever they send you off on training or even deployment can be considered a type of TDY. Usually they’re pretty competitive to get selected for, as it’s a huge break from daily monotony, and often comes with some relatively significant financial incentive (hazard pay, tax free income, per diem, relocation $).

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#302

Post by ranger207 »

john_strinlai wrote: post #300
appplication wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, I have some weirdly relevant direct experience to share here. Pokémon Go was released at the beginning of July 2016. A week later, the Air Force kicked off its Red Flag exercise in Nellis AFB outside of Vegas. For the several thousand active duty folks participating, this is a month-long TDY from their normal base to Vegas. The premise is a large-scale war simulation, and it encompasses essentially all…

military folk love their acronyms! i had no idea what "TDY" was. for others like me who may not know their military acronyms: AFB = air force base TDY = temporary duty SCIF = sensitive compartmented information facility OPSEC = operational security

temporarily deployed yonder

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#303

Post by ddejohn »

lukan wrote: post #263
ddejohn wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deeply sickening that modern society is such that we have to make room in our brains for objectively outlandish connections like these. That a children's cartoon and game about cute little companions has to in any way be involved in the same sentence as the flattening of a city and genocide is just... pure insanity. The world has truly, collectively, lost its fucking mind.

"The world has truly, collectively, lost its fucking mind." What time you have in mind, that was really better? (I believe the 90s were at least way more optimistic)

> What time you have in mind, that was really better?

Don't think there's ever been a time in human history that would qualify as good, but I will take better: any time pre-COVID. We have completely gone off the rails since the pandemic.

I don't really feel like elaborating.

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#305

Post by toponijo »

nonameiguess wrote: post #275
Aurornis wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even the Pokémon Go world model headlines were stretching the reality of what the model captured. If you’ve played the game, the scanning function is only for what they call Pokestops: These are points of interest that you can walk to and get items in the game. The game gives you points if you walk in a circle around one and take a short video. They’re relatively sparse. At most, they captured some 3D models of some…

Readers here really need to learn how to cut through hype better than they do. Pokemon go data is limited in far more ways. Many points of interest couldn't even be scanned like this because they were mural on the sides of buildings and don't even have more than one side. At least at first, there was no punishment for not actually scanning anything at all. You could walk in a circle with your phone pointed at the gro…

If you take these things together, they may be able to use the scanning feature to verify the existing stops. If it's non-existent no one could scan it, and they could remove those stops

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#307

Post by lukan »

ddejohn wrote: post #303
lukan wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The world has truly, collectively, lost its fucking mind." What time you have in mind, that was really better? (I believe the 90s were at least way more optimistic)

> What time you have in mind, that was really better? Don't think there's ever been a time in human history that would qualify as good , but I will take better : any time pre-COVID. We have completely gone off the rails since the pandemic. I don't really feel like elaborating.

"I don't really feel like elaborating."

Yes, maybe not the right place anyway. I agree that Covid initiated a accelerated downward spiral, but for me the turning point was already 9/11 and everything that followed.

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#308

Post by oe »

tim333 wrote: post #205
Aurornis wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even the Pokémon Go world model headlines were stretching the reality of what the model captured. If you’ve played the game, the scanning function is only for what they call Pokestops: These are points of interest that you can walk to and get items in the game. The game gives you points if you walk in a circle around one and take a short video. They’re relatively sparse. At most, they captured some 3D models of some…

Aside from the scanning function, they likely have many geolocated images from people catching pokemon in AR mode.

I don’t think people who play a lot use the AR mode when catching Pokémon. It’s easier without it, and saves some battery. But I could be mistaken.

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#309

Post by culi »

ccppurcell wrote: post #82

If you are looking for something to channel that energy into, you could help improve open street map using streetcomplete: https://streetcomplete.app/

This seems like the opposite of doing anything about it. Surely military contractors would just as readily use openstreetmap data if it's of sufficient quality.

Legislation establishing consumer ownership over their data and requiring consent for novel uses seems like the obvious, existing, movement to join

See:

- [Electronic Privacy Information Center](https://epic.org/) which is doing a lot of work to keep the CFPB in check to require explicit user consent for monetizing transactions

- [Electronic Frontier Foundation](https://www.eff.org/) which fights back against flawed legislation and has generally been uncompromising in their advocacy for an Opt-In Consent standard

- [Center for Democracy and Technology](https://cdt.org/) which is focused on countering algorithmic exploitation and advocating strict rules around "automated decision making tech" like opt-out rights before an AI uses their data to make decisions about their housing, credit, or employment

Re: Pokémon Go Scans Trained the Navigation Tech for Military Drones

#310

Post by culi »

fragmede wrote: post #100
christoph wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My 8 year old LOVES Pokemon Go, and we regularly go to a local meet up which is a fascinating microcosm of people of all ages from all walks of life. We’ve met some great people and had some incredible conversations, but I really struggle to see how we can continue in good faith now. I seriously loath, hate & despise everything about this digital panopticon world being constructed around us.

The data isn't guns though. Guns aren't a dual use technology that have a nonviolent purpose. Data is. The same data that trains military drones can also be used to train the robot that will bring food to grandma when she's so old that she can't walk up the stairs anymore.

Yeah but which use has more research funding behind it? We've always prioritized military uses and tech. The research landscape isn't flat.
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