4 ms·

Is this branding related to Blake's 7?

Jaruzel 8y ago
Probably not. The author seems american; The site has a very US news bias, and only has US politics filtering. Which is a shame. I hope the author plans to expand it to have a more global viewpoint. For those that don't know - 'Blake's 7' was a 1970s UK sci-fi TV show that had a portable 'super-computer' called Orac, whose personality was arrogant and aloof. The show was set in a dystopian future where a despised militarised government rules the galaxy. Still worth watching even now to be honest.
- nikolay 8y ago
  Thanks for the summary. Blake's 7 was my favorite Sci-Fi show as a child.
- jedwhite 8y ago
  Part of Orac's mission is to be very judgmental about content when ranking its quality and importance, so the allusion to being aloof and arrogant is little bit of a joke, but purposeful :)
- jedwhite 8y ago
  I'd commented above that the current feed is intended for testing, but that the plan is for you to add your own social feeds and news sources, and that it will then skew similar in finding additional sources. The "filter bubbles" are also intended as a couple of examples, so initially I've used US ones. I'm Australian and while I'm based in the US, one of the problems Orac is trying to solve is localisation. Orac is running geo and locale predictions on content, but they aren't very good so far, so I haven't included them in the UI or filtering yet. But a few folks who I've shown have said that it would be useful to filter content that's relevant by location, so that is definitely in the roadmap!
- jedwhite 8y ago
  Just to clarify: that is a "yes this is intended for a global audience" :) The preview version is fairly US-centric (language used, initial sources followed, example filter bubbles etc). But that is very much a starting point to show how the concept works in action. So that will change as it develops. The underlying algorithms are built with both global use and local filtering in mind. So stay tuned on that front!
jedwhite 8y ago
Yes it is. It's a tip of the hat to Terry Nation :) I'm Australian and loved Blake's 7 as a kid. The initial news sources are fairly US-centric (English speaking highest follows by category with a pretty noisy mix across a wide spectrum). That's because they are intended to be used for testing the algorithms as a start against a very noisy feed with a lot of objectionable content as well as good content. But the idea is that you will add your own social feeds and accounts (and news sources) and it will then skew to similar sources.
- nikolay 8y ago
  Oh, thank you! Well, most kids liked Blake, but my favorite was Avon. Here's a little compilation with him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWHLU8fwi80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWHLU8fwi80

Probably not. The author seems american; The site has a very US news bias, and only has US politics filtering. Which is a shame. I hope the author plans to expand it to have a more global viewpoint. For those that don't know - 'Blake's 7' was a 1970s UK sci-fi TV show that had a portable 'super-computer' called Orac, whose personality was arrogant and aloof. The show was set in a dystopian future where a despised militarised government rules the galaxy. Still worth watching even now to be honest.

nikolay 8y ago
Thanks for the summary. Blake's 7 was my favorite Sci-Fi show as a child.
jedwhite 8y ago
Part of Orac's mission is to be very judgmental about content when ranking its quality and importance, so the allusion to being aloof and arrogant is little bit of a joke, but purposeful :)
jedwhite 8y ago
I'd commented above that the current feed is intended for testing, but that the plan is for you to add your own social feeds and news sources, and that it will then skew similar in finding additional sources. The "filter bubbles" are also intended as a couple of examples, so initially I've used US ones. I'm Australian and while I'm based in the US, one of the problems Orac is trying to solve is localisation. Orac is running geo and locale predictions on content, but they aren't very good so far, so I haven't included them in the UI or filtering yet. But a few folks who I've shown have said that it would be useful to filter content that's relevant by location, so that is definitely in the roadmap!
jedwhite 8y ago
Just to clarify: that is a "yes this is intended for a global audience" :) The preview version is fairly US-centric (language used, initial sources followed, example filter bubbles etc). But that is very much a starting point to show how the concept works in action. So that will change as it develops. The underlying algorithms are built with both global use and local filtering in mind. So stay tuned on that front!

jedwhite 8y ago

Yes it is. It's a tip of the hat to Terry Nation :) I'm Australian and loved Blake's 7 as a kid. The initial news sources are fairly US-centric (English speaking highest follows by category with a pretty noisy mix across a wide spectrum). That's because they are intended to be used for testing the algorithms as a start against a very noisy feed with a lot of objectionable content as well as good content. But the idea is that you will add your own social feeds and accounts (and news sources) and it will then skew to similar sources.

nikolay 8y ago
Oh, thank you! Well, most kids liked Blake, but my favorite was Avon. Here's a little compilation with him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWHLU8fwi80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWHLU8fwi80