Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does • Hacker News Board

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#191

Post by dylan604 » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:08 AM UTC

Gigachad wrote: post #176

TobTobXX wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://friendlycaptcha.com/ Requires the browser to complete a Proof of Work challange. Not for verifying humanness, but against spam / dos attacks.

Proof of work is horrific. Means someones old phone has a meltdown trying to load the page while a warehouse in china with the latest GPUs cranks out billions of proofs per second. You could even utilize botnets to get random laptops and fridges to do your PoW.

If this was a mining situation, then yes, it would be dumb.

Is that what this is actually doing though? Is it PoW for a mining operation, or just causing some electrons to be moved around to prove your not a bot? I didn't read too far into what the PoW actually is since their demo shat the bed.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#192

Post by IggleSniggle » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:09 AM UTC

thaumaturgy wrote: post #148

mediocregopher wrote: post #7

For me a part of the melancholy feeling comes from the indignity of being forced to prove I'm human, and then the frustration at this stupid world we've created which requires me to do so which immediately follows the indignity. A website with captchas is like a retail store with metal detectors; it's not somewhere I feel welcome.

There's a little bit of praxis that I do for these (when I can't just bounce from the site or service requesting it): purposefully get about 25% of it wrong, misidentifying things that aren't traffic lights as traffic lights, or failing to identify all traffic lights, for example. I'll sometimes have to go through a few rounds of captcha but I don't mind that as much when every one is an opportunity to have a tiny co…

I’m confused about your reasoning. Translating scanned printed material into a searchable text is a social good, but providing safer transportation…that additionally may one day free drivers of the menial work of driving…that is not a social good?

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#193

Post by Damogran6 » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:10 AM UTC

mediocregopher wrote: post #7

For me a part of the melancholy feeling comes from the indignity of being forced to prove I'm human, and then the frustration at this stupid world we've created which requires me to do so which immediately follows the indignity. A website with captchas is like a retail store with metal detectors; it's not somewhere I feel welcome.

Blame the bastards hacking the website. Captchas are typically used to combat bot activity.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#194

Post by floydnoel » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:11 AM UTC

thaumaturgy wrote: post #148

mediocregopher wrote: post #7

For me a part of the melancholy feeling comes from the indignity of being forced to prove I'm human, and then the frustration at this stupid world we've created which requires me to do so which immediately follows the indignity. A website with captchas is like a retail store with metal detectors; it's not somewhere I feel welcome.

There's a little bit of praxis that I do for these (when I can't just bounce from the site or service requesting it): purposefully get about 25% of it wrong, misidentifying things that aren't traffic lights as traffic lights, or failing to identify all traffic lights, for example. I'll sometimes have to go through a few rounds of captcha but I don't mind that as much when every one is an opportunity to have a tiny co…

I do the same, I’ve noticed that the captcha doesn’t mind too much as long as I’m slow/methodical and get it mostly right

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#195

Post by OJFord » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:11 AM UTC

johnsolo1701 wrote: post #163

OJFord wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to vehemently agree and start ranting, but I see you've linked a submission that already has enough of me ranting! Ha. I'll only add that sometimes it annoys me so much I want to create my own 'Britcha' out of spite. Perhaps if I ever run some really popular site I shall: 'select all pubs', 'arrange the squares in order of social class', 'type the word that describes an ordered collection of people waitin…

Would totally make sense - when visiting .co.uk sites!

No it wouldn't. Just like American sites, there are very many .co.uk sites that (intentionally) serve a world audience.

Different language & currency support is fairly common, and where not present it's usually because other markets aren't deliberately served. I18n/l10n ought to extend to captcha too.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#196

Post by Damogran6 » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:13 AM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #51

Zababa wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being asked by a machine to prove that you are human is sometimes really humiliating, especially if you fail the captcha a few times in a row.

My favorite is finding errors on their side. I was tasked with finding the parking meters, and being told I was missing one. The "one" was an image of a mailbox, not a parking meter. Selecting the mailbox allowed it to say I was a human

Is a Bicycle a motorcycle? Will I kill one or the other by mis-categorizing it for the AI?

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#197

Post by lotsofpulp » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:14 AM UTC

Kaze404 wrote: post #189

lotsofpulp wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then use the fact that I am a paying customer of Hilton’s for years to mark my account as a human. I have the Hilton credit card, I am a Diamond member, what else do they want? I know why they force me though, I use content blockers on macOS and iOS to block tracking and ads, but that is not a good reason.

Can you share those content blockers? I recently acquired my first iOS device and have been suffering through the ads.

I use Wipr. Firefox Focus is a free one for iOS though.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#198

Post by perl4ever » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:17 AM UTC

mediocregopher wrote: post #7

For me a part of the melancholy feeling comes from the indignity of being forced to prove I'm human, and then the frustration at this stupid world we've created which requires me to do so which immediately follows the indignity. A website with captchas is like a retail store with metal detectors; it's not somewhere I feel welcome.

>the indignity of being forced to prove I'm human

It's worse than that - if I prove I'm human by choosing pictures the machine doesn't agree with it won't let me in.

I recently found that using IE made for exponentially more tests. Out of pique, I tried doing the opposite of what was requested; for instance, if it wanted me to click on fire hydrants until there were no more, I clicked on pictures without fire hydrants until every square had one.

But it never got tired, or decided it was wrong about what fire hydrants are, or deduced the rule I was following.

It won't even let me differ on, say, 1/4 of them.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#199

Post by IggleSniggle » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:17 AM UTC

Kaze404 wrote: post #189

lotsofpulp wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then use the fact that I am a paying customer of Hilton’s for years to mark my account as a human. I have the Hilton credit card, I am a Diamond member, what else do they want? I know why they force me though, I use content blockers on macOS and iOS to block tracking and ads, but that is not a good reason.

Can you share those content blockers? I recently acquired my first iOS device and have been suffering through the ads.

Not who you asked, but I use Firefox Focus as a content blocker. Since iOS only has Safari and WebViews (Safari in different clothes), you enable content blockers by going to Settings > Safari > Content Blockers.

Re: Captcha pictures force you to look at the world the way an AI does

#200

Post by Wowfunhappy » Sun, Aug 08, 2021, 1:18 AM UTC

IggleSniggle wrote: post #192

thaumaturgy wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a little bit of praxis that I do for these (when I can't just bounce from the site or service requesting it): purposefully get about 25% of it wrong, misidentifying things that aren't traffic lights as traffic lights, or failing to identify all traffic lights, for example. I'll sometimes have to go through a few rounds of captcha but I don't mind that as much when every one is an opportunity to have a tiny co…

I’m confused about your reasoning. Translating scanned printed material into a searchable text is a social good, but providing safer transportation…that additionally may one day free drivers of the menial work of driving…that is not a social good?

Agreed.

The problem, of course, is that the dataset is exclusive to Google, so while it may benefit society it's not creating a public good. But that's also true for text OCR.