Just how does machine learning work? You’ve probably read a primer or two on the subject, but often the best way to understand a thing is to try it out for yourself. With that in mind, check out this little in-browser experiment from Google named Teachable Machine. It’s a perfect two-minute summary of what a lot of modern AI can — and more importantly can’t— do.
Teachable Machine lets you use your webcam to train an extremely basic AI program. Just hit the “train green/purple/orange” buttons, and the machine will record whatever it can see through your webcam.
Once it’s “learned” enough, it’ll output whatever you like (a GIF or a sound effect or some speech) when it sees the object or activity you trained it with. Read More
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The Google Policy Fellowship is now accepting applications in North America. 2015 will mark the eighth summer of this program, which places undergraduate and graduate students at key tech policy think tanks and NGOs. Applications are open now through March 12, 2015.
Please help recruit top talent to this program! Our blog post has details about the program and application process that you can share with friends, alumni networks, and anyone else who is interested. Note that while Google facilitates the program and sponsors the fellows, we do not participate in the selection process. Host organizations choose their fellows directly.
This program has been great way to grow the next generation of tech policy advocates and build relationships with them at an early stage. In fact, a large number of Google Policy Fellows have become full time policy staff at their host organizations. Program alumni also have gone on to work for regulatory agencies, in academia, and at start ups.
If you have friends who are interested in the program and have questions beyond what is covered on the site, please feel free to connect them directly to [email protected].
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Last summer, students from all over the US and Canada gathered to explore pressing questions at the intersection of technology and policy. Whether working on data security standards at the National Consumers League or innovation economy issues at the R Street Institute, students gained hands-on experience tackling critical technology policy questions.
2015 is just beginning, but these issues show no signs of slowing down. We’re excited to announce the 8th annual Google Policy Fellowship, which connects students interested in emerging technology policy issues with leading nonprofits, think tanks, and advocacy groups.
Applications are open today for North America, and students of all levels and disciplines are welcome to apply before Thursday, March 12th.
This year’s organizations include: American Association of People with Disabilities American Enterprise Institute American Library Association Center for Democracy and Technology Center for Data Innovation Electronic Frontier Foundation Engine Future of Music Coalition Georgetown Center on Privacy & Technology Global Network Initiative Internet Education Foundation Internet Keep Safe Coalition Mercatus National Consumers League National Hispanic Media Coalition Open Technology Institute, New America Foundation Public Knowledge R Street Institute Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy & Public Interest Clinic TechFreedom Technology Policy Institute The Citizen Lab US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
More fellowship opportunities in Asia, Africa, and Europe will be coming soon. You can learn about the program,application processandhost organizations on the Google Public Policy Fellowship website.
I search for something on Google. The first 2 pages are sales links. The rest of the results are nonsense because Google decided to replace my keywords with “synonyms” or “similar terms” that are basically the opposite of what I was trying to search for. I contemplate setting my laptop on fire and pulling out the typewriter.
I had this experience just the other day it was ENRAGING
So, there’s a bunch of commands you can use for Google if it starts acting up. The best ones are -thing and “thing” If you notice dumb synonyms in your query get rid of it with Minus, and put quotes around the exact thing that NEEDS to be in the search results. You can also bypass this by using the Advanced search which does the exact same thing, but we’re busy people and we don’t have time for that shit.
I know about search syntax. I also remember a time when I was able to find useful information without spending an extra 5 minutes peppering my query with it literally every time I want to use the service.
Yeah. I’m legitimately very good at research and in the last five years Google has gotten steadily worse with a big drop about two years ago, and if you’re trying to find older information (say you want data on how masking impacted flu rates in Japan in 2009) you are basically screwed because its novelty weighting had gotten so much stronger.
Not to mention that a lot of search syntax does not work anymore. I can type in the same string of words in quotations on Google and on Bing; Bing will get me what I actually want, Google will claim it doesn’t exist. Bing is better than Google at finding the stuff I want.
I’m Not Afraid of AI Overlords— I’m Afraid of Whoever’s Training Them To Think That Way
by Damien P. Williams
I want to let you in on a secret: According to Silicon Valley’s AI’s, I’m not human.
Well, maybe they think I’m human, but they don’t think I’m me. Or, if they think I’m me and that I’m human, they think I don’t deserve expensive medical care. Or that I pose a higher risk of criminal recidivism. Or that my fidgeting behaviours or culturally-perpetuated shame about my living situation or my race mean I’m more likely to be cheating on a test. Or that I want to see morally repugnant posts that my friends have commented on to call morally repugnant. Or that I shouldn’t be given a home loan or a job interview or the benefits I need to stay alive.
Now, to be clear, “AI” is a misnomer, for several reasons, but we don’t have time, here, to really dig into all the thorny discussion of values and beliefs about what it means to think, or to be a mind— especially because we need to take our time talking about why values and beliefs matter to conversations about “AI,” at all. So instead of “AI,” let’s talk specifically about algorithms, and machine learning.
Machine Learning (ML) is the name for a set of techniques for systematically reinforcing patterns, expectations, and desired outcomes in various computer systems. These techniques allow those systems to make sought after predictions based on the datasets they’re trained on. ML systems learn the patterns in these datasets and then extrapolate them to model a range of statistical likelihoods of future outcomes.
Algorithms are sets of instructions which, when run, perform functions such as searching, matching, sorting, and feeding the outputs of any of those processes back in on themselves, so that a system can learn from and refine itself. This feedback loop is what allows algorithmic machine learning systems to provide carefully curated search responses or newsfeed arrangements or facial recognition results to consumers like me and you and your friends and family and the police and the military. And while there are many different types of algorithms which can be used for the above purposes, they all remain sets of encoded instructions to perform a function.
And so, in these systems’ defense, it’s no surprise that they think the way they do: That’s exactly how we’ve told them to think.
[Image of Michael Emerson as Harold Finch, in season 2, episode 1 of the show Person of Interest, “The Contingency.” His face is framed by a box of dashed yellow lines, the words “Admin” to the top right, and “Day 1” in the lower right corner.]
But I was at a wedding, so I had to pretend I’m fine, contorting my face to look something like this:
Another time, I got one of those “being let go” texts from a guy on my birthday. It had been days since our last date and as (lack of) luck would have it, he texted me while i was out with friends for my birthday celebration.
AND, once I got dumped by a bf right before he was supposed to meet my entire family for dinner…he didn’t make the dinner but everyone else did…
So yeah. Timing has not been an ally in my dating experiences.
Exactly 1 year ago today dcinthe80s.tumblr.com posted it’s first blog entry. I’d like to thank all of the fans for getting us this far.
A little bit about us:
Like just about anything else created on the blogosphere after 2010, DCinthe80s is standing on the shoulders of giants: the DCinthe80s journey started several years ago upon the discovery of comingsuperattractions.blogspot.ca, who posted house ads from DC publications throughout the last 6+ decades. Unfortunately, they ceased updating their blog in February 2009.
Jason Shayer’sMarvel Comics of the 1980s blog kept us enthralled for hours/days/weeks with his Marvel comics house ads, original art, and ‘anatomy of a cover’ features - but alas, why was there no 'DC Comics of the 80s’ blog? And hence, this DCinthe80s was born. At the time of our first post, we weren’t the only DC blog at the time*, but we were the only ones to focus exclusively on DC comics of the 80s. Jason Shayer would later create a DC comics of the 80s blog which would contain original art, house ads and the 'anatomy of a cover’ feature - totally worth checking out.
This blog simply started as posts of house ads that appeared in DC publications during the 1980s, but slowly began to evolve into mini-essays as we began to research the origin of the title, how readers enjoyed it, and whatever happened to it. It was also very interesting to note what kind of internal politics were occurring at the offices of DC comics at the time. Our mission was to uncover the “hidden story” behind the story - so to speak. You’ll notice that we put a lot of emphasis on the writers and editors of the titles, as we feel that they are the unsung heroes of the comic book industry (actually, that’s a lie - the real unsung heroes are the inkers, letterers and colorists - but we’ll cover that some other day).
That being said, we are a very small operation who submit articles to this blog on our free time. Our main sources for our info are various fanzines, back issues of comic journals, various internet sources (that we always reference on our facebook page), the letter columns of the issues we are reviewing (yes, we actually read the source material) and, sometimes, good ol’ fashion speculation and gumption. If you ever notice an error, please do not hesitate to correct us (preferably by e-mail or private message). We like to give credit where credit is due.
The goal of this blog is two-fold: 1) celebrate and 2) raise awareness about DC publications from the 1980s. DC comics is a business, and if enough people are enthusiastic about DC publications from the 1980s, we may be able to inspire a revival (wishful thinking) or at least reprints of previously uncollected material from the 1980s.
For the record, we are not anti-Marveloranti-Eclipseoranti-anything. We are not so naive as to believe that nothing else good came of the 1980s (in terms of comic book publications). We are not a “Make Mine DC or Nothing” blog. Additionally, while Superman, Batman, Teen Titans and the Legion of Super-Heroes may have been the more popular characters/titles of the 1980s, we like to spotlight the lesser-known/obscure characters/titles of the 1980s. At DCinthe 80s, all the titles get fair exposure (providing we have the house ad for them).
Future plans:
So far we’ve piloted a DC in the 80s google+ community, but it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, so it’s on hiatus at the moment. Same idea with the DC in the 80s wordpress site. (This might change if we suddenly get a huge influx of google+ or wordpress followers.) In the meanwhile, we are aiming to put more effort into bringing you quality articles. Our DC in the 80s twitter account is active and is often tweeting whatever new posts have been made to the facebook page.
We may be getting a new senior editor in March, so that’s something we are excited for. How long will this blog be going on for? Well, until we run out of house ads or until we’ve reviewed every publication DC has printed between 1979 to 1989 - whichever comes first. Hopefully we will have reminded/introduced you to a 1980s title you may have all but forgotten about.
How can you help?
We don’t want you money, we want your memories. Share these posts. Re-blog them back to us with your memories and/or opinions of the comic/house ad/title/article. We want to hear feedback. There is no such thing as a bad opinion (unless you are thrashing us, of course - we’re only doing this for the love of comics).
