Am I the only one thinking this is all rather convenient?
As any good PR team should do (and I know Apple's are excellent), after the big backlash they experienced over the GoogleVoice debacle, they are now slowly but surely turning it around.
OK, I am cynical, but using the old "you didn't understand my inflection" to win an argument is something I used against my sister - when I was 10.
Companies don't lie to the FCC. They will carefully phrase their answers, but they can't be caught telling an actual lie.
So yes, we can take their word for it.
Just keep in mind that their statements will be crafted to maximize what you think they mean and minize what they really mean.
An example I digged up recently about a privacy policy: "Examples of how we use your data: [very reasonable usage]". Doesn't say that that they don't use your data for other purposes. You just got tricked by a lawyer.
In the Apple AT&T case, they clearly say that they didn't chat about the Google Voice app directly. But they also admit that AT&T is telling Apple that in general, apps that consume bandwidth are not to be approved, and any app that does phone while using AT&T's network is no-no. So technically, they may not have discussed the particulars of Google Voice, but Apple may feel like they are doing AT&T's bidding without having to actually talk...
Yeah, that sounds reasonable. Sure, they may not have had a conference call where AT&T said "Jobs! Kill the Google Voice app!", but it's not like there aren't other ways for the message to get across. Competition with AT&T is the simplest and best explanation for why it was canned, and I would be very surprised if it was shown to be anything else.
I was hoping this was going to be a real breakdown and analysis of why things turned around for this blogger. For example, topics he wrote about then which he doesn't anymore or how his user base has changed compared to then.
Unfortunately, it lacks any real content and depth - it may as well have been written for Reader's Digest.
Fair point - in fact, I suggested on my blog that it may be a bit simplistic (or a confusion of correlation/causation) to simply say "my blog is successful because I stopped trying to make it successful": http://ashotofjd.com/post/168062040/marco-i-now-have-a-decen...
I enjoyed going through this list - so I thought you might too!
Here are a few to wet your taste buds:
- a thought-provoking one: Deorum iniuriae Diis curae. ("Offences to the gods are the concern of the gods." - Perhaps very apt in these times of religious tension.)
- a kind of meta-proverb: Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur. ("Anything said in Latin sounds profound." )
- a weird one: Temeas simium meum. ("Hold my monkey!" - Eh?)
Pecunia non olet ("money does not smell"). The phrase originally related to the urine tax levied by the Roman emperors Nero and Vespasian in the 1st century upon the collection of urine! Food for thought for the IRS!
Not to be the local pedant, but just a quick note on the "monkey" quote. Don't know where this came from but "temeas," to my knowledge, is not a Latin word - "teneas" is and signifies "may you hold," which in the quote would roughly translate as "may you hold my monkey" (I don't believe this has any notable usage in historic Latin).
"Teneo" (Latin: hold) comes into English with words such as "tenor" (one who holds (a note)), "tenacity" (the quality of holding on doggedly), "tenant" (one who holds possession), many others.
It seems to me that the long slow debate between these two philophers (add in Daniel Dennett on Hofstadter's side) turns on the fundamental philosophical question of where consciousness begins and ends, which has considerable ramifications beyond the field of artificial intelligence. I reject Searle's argument for reasons too long to go into here, but he is a very interesting philosopher in his own right.
While I'm on this topic, I may as well also mention Stanislaw Lem's essay Non Serviam excerpted here (http://themindi.blogspot.com/2007/02/chapter-19-non-serviam....) from A Perfect Vacuum: Perfect reviews of nonexistent books. Much, perhaps most, of Lem's output is concerned with the nature of consciousness and autonomy explored through the medium of fiction, just as Philip K dick tends to explore the same questions from a psychological standpoint.
I don't want to forego a stimulating intelectual discourse, but isn't it obvious?
Replace 'autonomous machine' with 'child' and it is clear a parent is responsible. For autonomous machines these are the owners. Machines may be autonomous, but if a real person is liable, then I am sure there will be plenty of checks and tests done to prevent any disasters.
In fact, the results of the accounting scandals not so long ago may be a good template. Investors were fully dependent on this autonomous, faceless, financial machine to churn out profits. That blew up in their face and they had no-one to blame. One result was the enactment of Sarbanes-Oxley which set, amongst other things, criminal penalties on individuals.
Interesting. However you forget one thing: Parents are not liable for damage their children do. E.g. in Germany as long as parents do not violate the obligatory supervision neither can they nor their children be made liable for any acts of their children.
Your example implicitly means that you do agree someone needs to be made liable for the child through 'obligatory supervision' - because if you don't do that, you will be accountable.
You say 'as long as parents do not violate'. Indeed, as long as you do what is required to ensure nothing goes wrong ("bonus pater familias"), but an accident still happens, then society/German Law accepts no one is liable.
Your argument seems to point more to: How do you define someone as liable and how do you enforce it?
If we take the case of the robot surgeon, then the person/institution who made the decision to use the robot would presumably be responsible (e.g. in this case, the hospital). The 'obligatory supervision' in this case would mean running regular tests, getting it repaired, etc...
I think in most cases we can come up with someone who is responsible for the robot. The person who owns it will generally be the person responsible but there will be exceptions (e.g. if I borrow your robot, break the "don't attack people" software and then use it).
If, after doing all the maintenance, the robot surgeon still kills someone, then you would need to investigate. Did something go wrong with the robot? If so, is this a defect in design that the manufacturers should have thought of? If so, blame them. If not, well, no one is to blame (unless it happens with the next model... where they should have learned from the past). I suspect we'd also end up seeing recalls of robots when flaws are detected, as we do with cars occasionally.
> Your example implicitly means that you do agree someone needs to be made liable for the child through 'obligatory supervision' - because if you don't do that, you will be accountable.
Sorry, I only tried to describe the legal situation in Germany. 'Aufsichtspflicht' is a legal term, and its translation is 'obligatory supervision'. The law says that parents are responsible for controlling their children in a sane way. I.e. your child can walk or bike to school unattended, but if you give her dangerous substances to play with and turn your back, you are held liable.
> Your argument seems to point more to: How do you define someone as liable and how do you enforce it?
That's what the courts do. As far as I know they use common sense and social norms to determine how much you have to guard your children.
This was submitted 561 days ago (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=109654) but I think it deserves a repost. I have been lurking here a while and only just discovered it. There are some real gems (stories/discussions) to be explored this way.
I started looking at 'Users with Most Points per Submission' and lost an hour before I knew it. Oh, and I guess if you want to rig the system, then 'Top Domains by Points per Submission' could be of help.
Maybe some of you haven't seen this either so I thought I'd share.
I agree with this same sentiment, even if some would argue reposts are redundant or even a bug from some communities who aggregate news similarly, but when it comes down to it, I think reposts highlights a key attribute of 'what a we're all about' or 'what kind of products/stories describe us best', reposts serve as an interesting indicator of any community's (at least those communities who measure their users according to karma) core principles and values.
If anything, Top Reposts is certainly worth iterating as an additional list for top.searchyc, although scraping it could be tricky
OK, it is just a bit of fun and maybe not very HN-like, but I can imagine it did take quite a bit of thought to make and it is a powerful representation.
If only every business/technical illustration I saw at work was as clear and concise as this was...
1. Doesn't every phone these days have a voice trigger to call someone? My old Nokia has and it works pretty well.
2. It seems to require some touching to use. Tap to run app. Tap to start recording. Tap after a status update. Tap tap tap... I thought this was voice-controlled?
3. Searching the internet using your voice doesn't seem that practical. At least by looking at how I use search - using wildcards and such. So it may be a bit restrictive.
4. The voice layer on top of Google and Yahoo will, of course, require a hotspot. Not always available and it may be expensive.
5. I may see this being useful for disabled people.
6. How accurate is voice recognition and pickup really?
7. Is there no chance that Google Voice can become a competitor in the future? They have all the voice recognition expertise - just look at voicemail to text feature. Potential competition from Google must be considered.
8. It doesn't appear to be especially speedy.
In conclusion, it is not that appealing to me but seeing as it is free to try basic features, I may try it out anyway.
Thank you for your detailed reply. I've never actually used the application as I don't have a blackberry or an iPhone (I'm an Android user). I just ran across this service and was wondering what HN would think of such an application. If you or anyone else out there is willing to test it out, please do post what you think about its quality and functionality to this thread. Thanks
As any good PR team should do (and I know Apple's are excellent), after the big backlash they experienced over the GoogleVoice debacle, they are now slowly but surely turning it around.
OK, I am cynical, but using the old "you didn't understand my inflection" to win an argument is something I used against my sister - when I was 10.