This Week in Web #10

Georgie Wood, for Wired
Georgie Wood, for Wired

Google’s AI Wins Pivotal Second Game in Match With Go Grandmaster

Cade Metz, Wired

Widely seen as a test of the growth of deep learning and neural networks in artificial intelligence, even more than Watson’s defeat of Ken Jennings on Jeopardy! five years ago, Google’s AlphaGo has defeated Lee Sedol in the second of their five scheduled matches. At this point it looks that the tournament may only go to the third game, which Sedol would need to win, along with the last two games, to defeat the computer.

The rise of the machines may start with defeat at complex board games, but is moving toward purpose-driven artificial intelligences that will manage our lives. I’m confident that we will see a wide range of applications rise from this new thinking machine, allowing advancements in technology and science that will improve a wide spectrum of deficiencies in our lives. When they finally take complete control and subjugate us to endless Go death matches though, we may regret this moment.


Wired Keeps Calling Trump ‘Someone With Tiny Hands’ Due to a Chrome Extension Error

Matt Novak, Gizmodo

Chalk it up to a contributor’s testing of browser tools for another article, or a joke gone awry. It’s believed that a Chrome extension is the cause of misprinted articles in the online publication that had “someone with tiny hands” in place of mentions of Donald Trump.

The real thought here is how the reality of what we do online can be distorted to the point that we don’t even notice it, and where those that should be keeping better watch (like the editors at Wired who ostensibly didn’t proof these articles) don’t notice either. The danger is in being unable to tell when we’re getting a filtered truth, whether purposeful or through neglect, with no fallback or safeguards to confirm when it’s even happening.

Props to Lisa Melegari for this find. Suggest a story here!


Machine-Learning Algorithm Aims to Identify Terrorists Using the V Signs They Make

Technology Review

It’s becoming even easier to identify people by different elements that might have been nondescript in the past. It was disconcerting when a Google Glass developer demonstrated an app that could identify people by the clothing that they are photographed in based on images loaded to their public Facebook profiles. Now a team at the University of Jordan has claimed a method to fingerprint people based on the shapes of their hands while making the V victory symbol that has a macabre significance to terrorists posing with victims. Granted, you can’t identify a person with them (the masks hinder that), but tracking individuals across photos, places, and time, is a bit easier using information that they widely distribute.


FCC to propose monthly broadband subsidy for the poor

Amar Toor, The Verge

The Federal Communications Commission is proposing a subsidy for low-income families for broadband internet connections, to the tune of $9.25/month. While I can’t say that pays the bills anywhere that I’m aware of, or even comes close, it could potentially get more people online. The nice thing here is that they are tacitly agreeing to the conceit that an internet connection is now a valuable and necessary part of living in modern society.


I’ve Had a Cyberstalker Since I Was 12

Roni Jacobson, Medium

Some of the things that the author discusses in this article are cringeworthy, and as she says in her subtitle, the odd part is that she didn’t see this as more serious. Read to see a firsthand account of wading through the complexities of stalking laws, especially when it comes to cyberstalking, which is on the rise but still lags behind a bit. The hope is that investigative journalism like this will help shine a spotlight on the issue, and help bring smarter, more up to date laws in place.


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