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We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

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Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#41

Post by tomp »

pea wrote: post #29

An annoying example which has gotten worse recently is recipes. I generally trawl through 5k words of someone's life story and product promotions to get to the piece of information I need, and they often rewrite the recipe 5 different times in different levels of detail -- is this because to make the first page rank on Google you need to pad out the SEO? I too always find myself doing site:reddit.com.

a few more that I swear by:

    site:greatbritishchefs.com site:greatitalianchefs.com site:seriouseats.com
WARNING: the last one usually has 2 pages listed for each recipe - the recipe itself, and also a "story" blog post - except that the "story" is also very useful (not "someone's life story" which is basically spam), because it explains the reasoning behind the method, different alternatives and the trade-offs between them, and the experimentation that it took the author to derive it

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#42

Post by emptyfile »

tolbish wrote: post #38
selfhoster11 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally append "site:reddit.com" like in the article whenever I'm looking for reviews and comparisons. Google is nearly useless for finding content among the sea of crap and autogenerated near-crap (like Slant). I might click on the links going to sites that I half-remember by name, but for open-ended searches it's a lost war.

Google modified the algorithm a while back to ignore such flags at times.

They did a bad job then, since they still work.

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#43

Post by darkerside »

lights0123 wrote: post #27
darkerside wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it uses both? My Honda can tell me the speed limit, and I'm sure it's not using the internet to do it.

There's no reason it couldn't have them stored locally. If your car has an on-screen map, it's probably been downloaded to the car directly like standalone GPS units popular years ago.

It doesn't. And the sign seems to pop up after I pass a speed limit sign.

EDIT: Here's info on it. https://www.dowhonda.com/2017/11/17/traffic-sign-recognition...

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#44

Post by ipython »

fouc wrote: post #2

> There are woolly intimations that self driving cars will read roadsigns to work out what the speed limit is for any stretch of road but the truth seems to be that they use the current GPS co-ordinates to access manually entered data on speedlimits. I actually didn't know Tesla cars relied on GPS + map data w/ speed limits until recently. What a disappointment, apparently it causes all sorts of issues with sudden br…

I have an Audi that has both speed limit info and stop light info in the dash. I know for a fact that it uses the camera for the speed limit signs as it will interpret school zone areas. Sometimes it misses the “end school zone” sign or not recognize the yellow border around the school zone begin sign. You can see the display become out of sync with the road conditions until the next speed limit sign appears.

As far as the stop light data, that’s fed into Audi through a select number of state DOTs (mine is one of them). It’s almost magical that it can tell you when the light will turn green.

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#45

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

pea wrote: post #29

An annoying example which has gotten worse recently is recipes. I generally trawl through 5k words of someone's life story and product promotions to get to the piece of information I need, and they often rewrite the recipe 5 different times in different levels of detail -- is this because to make the first page rank on Google you need to pad out the SEO? I too always find myself doing site:reddit.com.

Google page ranking depends on how long people spend on the webpage, so if you have to wade through longform text, it mistakenly assumes that the content is quality.

Note that most recipe blogs are fake. Someone wrote the original content long ago. Then, someone else hired a copywriter off a freelancing platform to change the words of the text just enough to avoid copyright violation, then put up a new copycat website loaded with SEO and ads. Look closely and notice how the author’s bio says e.g. "Born and bred in Lousiania and I love to share southern cooking", but the text contains grammatical mistakes typical of Eastern Europeans or Southeast Asians.

The ecosystem is already so advanced that new copycat recipe websites are often based on previous copycat recipe websites.

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#46

Post by devoutsalsa »

cainxinth wrote: post #22
gverrilla wrote: post #6

amazing quotes: > Larry Page and Sergey Brin were originally pretty negative about search engines that sold ads. Appendix A in their original paper says: we expect that advertising-funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of theconsumers and that we believe the issue of advertising causes enough mixed incentives that it is crucial to have acompetitive search engi…

I guess the prospect of literally a hundred billion dollars each made them reconsider.

Which would one?

1. One search engine w/ hundreds of thousands of employeers & bajillions in revenue

2. One search engine w/ like 3 people & a chonky Patreon account

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#47

Post by virgilp »

fouc wrote: post #33
virgilp wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My car already does a pretty good job of showing the speed limits (and it's definitely based on computer vision/ works offline and in places where map metadata is poor). And it doesn't have "self driving", just a limited "pilot assist". Not sure why reading road signs is used as and example of "extremely hard thing to do" - there are other way harder things that cars can't currently do. E.g. figuring out the right sp…

Actually I think road speeds for various curves are pretty standardized, so it shouldn't be that hard for the car to estimate the correct speed based on the curve.

It's a tad more complicated than that - it needs to consider also driving conditions, any hazards on the road. Probably can't be done on computer vision alone, you need at least some sensors to get a "feel" of how good is the road grip.

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#48

Post by ipython »

fouc wrote: post #33
virgilp wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My car already does a pretty good job of showing the speed limits (and it's definitely based on computer vision/ works offline and in places where map metadata is poor). And it doesn't have "self driving", just a limited "pilot assist". Not sure why reading road signs is used as and example of "extremely hard thing to do" - there are other way harder things that cars can't currently do. E.g. figuring out the right sp…

Actually I think road speeds for various curves are pretty standardized, so it shouldn't be that hard for the car to estimate the correct speed based on the curve.

My Audi tries to account for curves in the road when running on cruise control through the onboard nav. It’s horrendously conservative in its opinion of the maximum safe speed to the point I find it dangerous to rely upon. If I left it to its own devices, other cars would be passing me as if I were standing still. Otherwise the driver assist features are fairly slick.

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#49

Post by soarfourmore »

The following quotes are fairly interesting and ironic:

> Larry Page and Sergey Brin were originally pretty negative about search engines that sold ads. Appendix A in their original paper says:

>> "we expect that advertising-funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers"

> and that

>> "we believe the issue of advertising causes enough mixed incentives that it is crucial to have a competitive search engine that is transparent and in the academic realm"

Re: We were promised Strong AI, but instead we got metadata analysis

#50

Post by ullevaal »

lights0123 wrote: post #27
darkerside wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it uses both? My Honda can tell me the speed limit, and I'm sure it's not using the internet to do it.

There's no reason it couldn't have them stored locally. If your car has an on-screen map, it's probably been downloaded to the car directly like standalone GPS units popular years ago.

Well, the problem with builtin GPS in cars is that you will often find yourself driving on brand new highways, while the car is complaining that you are driving in terrain and need to get back on the road.
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