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Twttr is (very subtly) better than Twitter

Mar15
by on March 15, 2019 at 10:23 pm
Posted In: Around the Web


Twitter made its beta testing app, branded “twttr,” sound so mysterious, like accessing it would give you access to some super-secret prototype version of Twitter (or at least that’s what I was imagining). The reality is it’s almost disappointingly similar to basic, vanilla Twitter — but what few changes there are, I appreciate. When I downloaded the Twttr beta, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I was bracing myself for unfamiliar face, something that looked radically different from the Twitter I was used to. I really needn’t have worried. I don’t know if Twitter‘s got a horror of showing…

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Reddit operates exactly as it was designed — and that’s a problem

Mar15
by on March 15, 2019 at 9:26 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Opinion


After carefully selecting a semi-automatic weapon from the trunk of his car, one of at least three, a 28-year-old Australian, calmly walked to the front door of the Masjid Al Noor mosque. He shot a man standing in the doorway before entering the mosque and opening fire on fleeing Muslims. It was all captured on a head-mounted camera. The video, some 17 minutes of footage in total, depicts a man on a mission. The shooter was calm, collected, and business-like in his task, gunning down man, woman, and child before returning to his car to reload, and then ultimately making…

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What can psychopaths teach us about AI?

Mar15
by on March 15, 2019 at 7:09 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, artificial intelligence


What happens when machines learn to manipulate us by faking our emotions? Judging by the rate at which researchers are developing human-like AI agents, we’re about to find out. Researchers around the world are trying to create more human-like AI. By definition, they’re developing artificial psychopaths. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing – there’s nothing inherently wrong with being a psychopath, and all AI agents are artificial psychopaths simply because they lack the full range of neurotypical human emotion. But the overlap between psychopathic behavior and AI agent behavior is undeniable. We should look into it before it’s too late.…

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Rift widens between Epic and gamers over data mining allegations

Mar15
by on March 15, 2019 at 6:34 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, gaming


Epic Games is being torn a new one by gamers again. This time, it’s been accused of mining users’ Steam data without their permission. As you’d expect, Epic’s critics are taking it as fresh grist in the ongoing controversy over Epic’s storefront — which might turn off developers who want to bring their games there in future. The concern appears to have originated in a Reddit thread. In short, the thread creator claimed the Epic launcher was running processes and attempting to access root certificates and DLLs without permission. They also said the data it found went back to Epic, and…

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We reviewed this $35K Sony projector with old internet videos

Mar15
by on March 15, 2019 at 4:12 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Plugged


Remember the old days of the internet? When you had to actually load videos? Yes, those times sure were both magnificent and awful times. And this got me thinking – could we combine the worlds? And watch old internet videos on modern new tech? I mean, yes. Of course you can, that’s a stupid question. That’s not going to stop me reviewing the $34,999.99 (lol) Sony VPL-VW870ES/VPL-VW995ES 4K projector by watching shitty old internet videos on it though. Buckle in. This sounds dumb, but fine. First question: who would buy such an expensive projector? Sony’s projector is aimed at small venues –…

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