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Add to that a justice system also mostly automated and you are quickly caught in a Kafkaesque nightmare you can't get out if something goes wrong. Imagine the j

Add to that a justice system also mostly automated and you are quickly caught in a Kafkaesque nightmare you can't get out if something goes wrong. Imagine the justice system run like google support. Even if something is clearly wrong you can't clear it up if you are not a famous person with a big Twitter following.

icebraining 8y ago
On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. Similarly, Google could have a mostly automated system detecting violations and such, and also a good human support system with power to override the decisions of the former; the two are not really incompatible.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  I know an Android dev who had his Play account shut down for an unjustified reason. It took him a very long time to reactivate it. Especially the little guy doesn't get much attention from humans. That was a few years ago. Maybe it's better now.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    I'm not saying Google's support is good. I'm saying the automation is not necessarily the culprit for its ills.
    - tjoff 8y ago
      I'd say that the automation enables it to be an order of magnitude worse. And it will be worse for any entity that doesn't really care about it.
      - ams6110 8y ago
        It's probably worse for a few, and better for a lot. Maybe the Google automation is shutting down a hundred nefarious developers for every one legitimate developer. Without the automation all would be active; with the automation one guy gets screwed and it's hard for him to navigate his way back, but thousands of users are better off
        maxxxxx 8y ago
        Most justice systems are built on the assumption that it's better to let 100 guilty people go than convicting one innocent person. Once we accept that it's OK to convict innocent people as long as the averages are fine then we are heading into serious trouble.
        drivebycomment 8y ago
        You're comparing a merchant system with a criminal justice system. Obviously the cost or the downside of false positive is very different between those two, as well as the cost of making the judgement itself, given the difference in scale.
        maxxxxx 8y ago
        We are talking about the justice system here.
- reaperducer 8y ago
  On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. They said the same thing about banking when we got ATM's. But banking has only gotten worse, more impersonal, and more frustrating and alienating for the average person.
  - KaoruAoiShiho 8y ago
    Need a source on this, I highly doubt it. Online banking and ATMs have been great for me.
  - the-pigeon 8y ago
    Out of curiosity could you explain what you mean? I'm not nearly old enough to remember prior to ATMs. But I love ATMs. I only have to go inside the bank to do things once every few years. Everything else is on the phone or ATM. And the people I deal with on the phone are almost always very helpful and knowledgeable. I know people have a lot of trouble with some of the big banks like Bank of America and Chase. But those aren't issues with the banking industry but those specific companies. There's plenty of smaller banks and credit unions who don't exploit their customers at every opportunity.
    - reaperducer 8y ago
      I'm not nearly old enough to remember prior to ATMs. I am. When ATM's started to become a thing, we were told that with ATM's automating the basics, the bankers and tellers would have more time for more personalized service, Banks would lower fees through cost savings, and we'd all have higher interest rates on our savings because the banks would save so much money. None of those things happened. Things just got worse. A couple of years ago I tried to get a loan. A credit union I tried to approach wouldn't let ask questions of someone on the phone, or in a branch, until I'd cleared the computer's online pre-screening. At another bank (Chase), a banker sat down with me, but was not able to discuss my finances in any way. All he could do was punch my information into his computer, and give me the same information I would have gotten by doing the same process online. Citibank, at least, let me talk to someone in person who seemed interested in my business. But then I went on vacation, and by the time I returned two weeks later, the offer was no longer valid and I was referred to the web site. Again, things have gotten worse not better. Just because you're too young to know that things were once better doesn't mean they're not worse.
- rocqua 8y ago
  If the escalation is accessible, everyone will try it. That includes anyone who got handled correctly. And as detection becomes more accurate, an even larger ratio of escalations will be blatantly wrong. This explains why slightly inept well meaning companies shy away from such escalation paths. I wonder about the stats on appeals in court. How many are successful. How many go to an appeal at all. How costly is a single appeal / how costly is the average successful appeal.
  - GFischer 8y ago
    Some games (League of Legends, Ingress) have or had crowdsourced 1st level appeals for minor infractions. Maybe that's the way to go. I know many volunteers answer Google's forums.
    - kkarakk 8y ago
      yes i want a random dude who thinks asian people are just naturally bad drivers to judge my traffic fine
    - notSupplied 8y ago
      That system (the tribunal) is gone. It has been replaced by ML (probably trained by Tribunal data) and hence 99% automated.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    "Escalation" implies the first decision is automated; I was suggesting more of a process where the "fact finding" is automated, but the decision is still manual. That said, even the system you're describing and with a 100% escalation rate should be cheaper than a fully manual process. The problem is that those "well meaning" companies aren't; their goal is to minimize cost, stopping only if it drops their revenue. But no system will be good with such goals.
- tivert 8y ago
  > have a mostly automated system detecting violations and such, and also a good human support system with power to override the decisions of the former; the two are not really incompatible. While that's true in the abstract, I don't think it's true in present society. Both private companies and government are under near-constant pressure to cut costs, and the people who are charged with implementing those cuts will be tempted to under-resource the human override team or cut it entirely. Quality of service isn't the priority.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    The exact same argument can be made to those criticizing the use of automation: it doesn't matter, because that pressure means it will be used anyway. And the whole discussion becomes meaningless.
    - hueving 8y ago
      No, when economic systems pressure companies into cutting corners, it's completely fair to criticize the situation. "Think of all of the money people are saving by allowing businesses to refuse service to disabled people." A system with massive net positive social utility does not alone justify injustice for a few.
- mtgx 8y ago
  Another way to look at it is that an organization that is willing to automate everything for the sake of efficiency/profit is probably not too interested in "adding a lot more quality human support to compensate for that extreme automation". Chances are it wants to automate 100% (or at least 99.99%) of it jobs and will strive to achieve that, while considering any human cost as "friction" or inefficiency that needs to be eliminated.
- bsder 8y ago
  > On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. Justice systems are always about exceptions. Computers handle exceptions EXTREMELY poorly. A justice system should be required to have a human on record for every action taken against another human being. The computers can be used to verify this, but they should not be allowed to be primary.
james_s_tayler 8y ago
I just finished reading The Secret Barrister and it already seems to be the case, at least in the UK, that if something is wrong you can't really clear it up.
- olivermarks 8y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_the_Law_and_How_It%27s_Broken https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_the_Law_and_How_It%... Thank you, I will read this
ryanmarsh 8y ago
This is something ordinary people who haven’t run afoul of the justice system cannot understand. It must be witnessed first hand to be comprehended. The justice system is a big boulder at the top of a mountain. Once an arrest or accusation sets in it motion, unless you are powerful and or wealthy, it will do what boulders do, it can do no different. It is not cognizant, it just is. It takes immense resources to stop or avoid this boulder. Resources far exceeding even the well-to-do often times. The system is there to win cases and incarcerate and my god does it do just that. Innocent or not, the system moves humans. Do not pray the jury hears your side, pray you never get so much as accused. Look up the conviction rates for district attorneys across the country. You tell me, does that look justice?
- ams6110 8y ago
  I'd expect conviction rates to be pretty high. It means they are only bringing charges when they have strong evidence. If conviction rates were low I'd be asking why that prosecutor was wasting his time on cases he can't win.
  - ryanmarsh 8y ago
    It means they are only bringing charges when they have strong evidence We would hope so. It could also mean far worse things are happening. We’ve all seen documentaries and news shows of people wrongly convicted. Why do we think the only incidences are the ones reported. I’ve watched detectives lie on the stand when a guilty verdict was already in hand. Why do that? How do they treat the innocent if that’s how they act when the facts of the case are enough to convict?
eloff 8y ago
This sounds like a lot of people's experiences with Equifax and Transunion. They make a mistake and it can take you a decade and a lot of money and effort to clear your name.
baddox 8y ago
I don’t know how to compare the US justice system to Google support, but the former is already notoriously difficult, expensive, inefficient, and inaccessible to large groups of people.
redthrowaway 8y ago
If you're big enough, Google provides excellent support. I was once responsible for a product that generated $30k/month in adsense revenue. It got banned due to adult content and my attempts to clean everything up weren't entirely successful. I ended up on chat with someone from adsense and they essentially held my hand for an hour as we found and removed every bit of porn in the product.
lostgame 8y ago
Okay, I think I can do one worse. Imagine if the justice system was like Apple's App Store acceptance/rejection system. Sorry for putting that in your head, y'all.
slyall 8y ago
A classic short story along this line is: Computers Don't Argue by Gordon R. Dickson A man has a complaint with his book club, but a series of errors escalate things alarmingly. The Wikipedia article has the whole plot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computers_Don%27t_Argue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computers_Don%27t_Argue
- ryacko 8y ago
  Or have the actual story: https://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=133 https://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=133
  - jammygit 8y ago
    I feel weird about reading sci fi for free online. I feel like its unnatural and that it should come from used bookstores like god intended. I miss used bookstores, most of the big ones in my city have closed down
    - 8bitsrule 8y ago
      According to one online source, 'jammygit', you bought several Phil Dick novels at one of those used bookstores. Maybe that's why you feel 'weird'. I also regret the loss of so many used bookstores ... one of my favorite haunts. We can only try to visit the survivors much more often.
      - modzu 8y ago
        PKD's electric sheep was one of the first things i read "online" -- via BBS baby
  - 8bitsrule 8y ago
    Oh my. I've read that story in the distant past. It was merely hilarious at that time. Today I was grimacing.
delbel 8y ago
This is literally the plot to the 1971 George Lucas sci-fi film THX 1138, down to the detail: "set in a dystopian future in which the populace is controlled through android police ... ."
brailsafe 8y ago
Google has support?
013a 8y ago
The purpose of computers is to enhance the ability of humans who have a job to accomplish, not do their job for them. If we don't figure this out as a society, we're doomed.
- CogitoCogito 8y ago
  Also the operators of a computer system should always be held responsible for any errors of that system. Mistakes by the system are your* mistakes. Any decisions made by the system must be explained by you. All costs rectifying those mistakes must be bared by you. *Obviously "you" means your organization, company, etc. and not necessarily some random office clerk.
- sgustard 8y ago
  "I predict that within fifteen years, AI will be able to replace 40 to 50 percent of jobs in the US." - Kai-Fu Lee
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dmix 8y ago
The justice system is hardly automated. It's one of the least automated systems (ie, employing technology to reduce inefficiencies) of all industry 'niches' in the western world. Law enforcement might be using technology to dole out punishment/fines more efficiently, but the actual justice system that civilians have to deal with after getting fined or charged (ie, the world of lawyers, judges, and courts) is extremely backwards in their use of humans, paper, fax machines, etc. Not using even basic technology. The justice system is famous for the extreme slowness for the amount of human-time required in processing of even the most basic small details. By eliminating the amount of human-time (by a hired lawyer or oneself) that each person has to engage the systems (for example by missing work or paying with money instead of time) would do a lot of help the poor better deal with the justice system - and get better and fairer treatment by the system.
jammygit 8y ago
on a tangent... "caught in a Kafkaesque nightmare" I've been meaning to read kafka one day. Is there a title in specific you would recommend to start with?
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  I don't know how good the English translations are but I would look at "the Trial" or "Metamorphosis". This is a good short story: https://genius.com/Franz-kafka-before-the-law-annotated https://genius.com/Franz-kafka-before-the-law-annotated

icebraining 8y ago

On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. Similarly, Google could have a mostly automated system detecting violations and such, and also a good human support system with power to override the decisions of the former; the two are not really incompatible.

maxxxxx 8y ago
I know an Android dev who had his Play account shut down for an unjustified reason. It took him a very long time to reactivate it. Especially the little guy doesn't get much attention from humans. That was a few years ago. Maybe it's better now.
- icebraining 8y ago
  I'm not saying Google's support is good. I'm saying the automation is not necessarily the culprit for its ills.
  - tjoff 8y ago
    I'd say that the automation enables it to be an order of magnitude worse. And it will be worse for any entity that doesn't really care about it.
    - ams6110 8y ago
      It's probably worse for a few, and better for a lot. Maybe the Google automation is shutting down a hundred nefarious developers for every one legitimate developer. Without the automation all would be active; with the automation one guy gets screwed and it's hard for him to navigate his way back, but thousands of users are better off
      - maxxxxx 8y ago
        Most justice systems are built on the assumption that it's better to let 100 guilty people go than convicting one innocent person. Once we accept that it's OK to convict innocent people as long as the averages are fine then we are heading into serious trouble.
        drivebycomment 8y ago
        You're comparing a merchant system with a criminal justice system. Obviously the cost or the downside of false positive is very different between those two, as well as the cost of making the judgement itself, given the difference in scale.
        maxxxxx 8y ago
        We are talking about the justice system here.
reaperducer 8y ago
On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. They said the same thing about banking when we got ATM's. But banking has only gotten worse, more impersonal, and more frustrating and alienating for the average person.
- KaoruAoiShiho 8y ago
  Need a source on this, I highly doubt it. Online banking and ATMs have been great for me.
- the-pigeon 8y ago
  Out of curiosity could you explain what you mean? I'm not nearly old enough to remember prior to ATMs. But I love ATMs. I only have to go inside the bank to do things once every few years. Everything else is on the phone or ATM. And the people I deal with on the phone are almost always very helpful and knowledgeable. I know people have a lot of trouble with some of the big banks like Bank of America and Chase. But those aren't issues with the banking industry but those specific companies. There's plenty of smaller banks and credit unions who don't exploit their customers at every opportunity.
  - reaperducer 8y ago
    I'm not nearly old enough to remember prior to ATMs. I am. When ATM's started to become a thing, we were told that with ATM's automating the basics, the bankers and tellers would have more time for more personalized service, Banks would lower fees through cost savings, and we'd all have higher interest rates on our savings because the banks would save so much money. None of those things happened. Things just got worse. A couple of years ago I tried to get a loan. A credit union I tried to approach wouldn't let ask questions of someone on the phone, or in a branch, until I'd cleared the computer's online pre-screening. At another bank (Chase), a banker sat down with me, but was not able to discuss my finances in any way. All he could do was punch my information into his computer, and give me the same information I would have gotten by doing the same process online. Citibank, at least, let me talk to someone in person who seemed interested in my business. But then I went on vacation, and by the time I returned two weeks later, the offer was no longer valid and I was referred to the web site. Again, things have gotten worse not better. Just because you're too young to know that things were once better doesn't mean they're not worse.
rocqua 8y ago
If the escalation is accessible, everyone will try it. That includes anyone who got handled correctly. And as detection becomes more accurate, an even larger ratio of escalations will be blatantly wrong. This explains why slightly inept well meaning companies shy away from such escalation paths. I wonder about the stats on appeals in court. How many are successful. How many go to an appeal at all. How costly is a single appeal / how costly is the average successful appeal.
- GFischer 8y ago
  Some games (League of Legends, Ingress) have or had crowdsourced 1st level appeals for minor infractions. Maybe that's the way to go. I know many volunteers answer Google's forums.
  - kkarakk 8y ago
    yes i want a random dude who thinks asian people are just naturally bad drivers to judge my traffic fine
  - notSupplied 8y ago
    That system (the tribunal) is gone. It has been replaced by ML (probably trained by Tribunal data) and hence 99% automated.
- icebraining 8y ago
  "Escalation" implies the first decision is automated; I was suggesting more of a process where the "fact finding" is automated, but the decision is still manual. That said, even the system you're describing and with a 100% escalation rate should be cheaper than a fully manual process. The problem is that those "well meaning" companies aren't; their goal is to minimize cost, stopping only if it drops their revenue. But no system will be good with such goals.
tivert 8y ago
> have a mostly automated system detecting violations and such, and also a good human support system with power to override the decisions of the former; the two are not really incompatible. While that's true in the abstract, I don't think it's true in present society. Both private companies and government are under near-constant pressure to cut costs, and the people who are charged with implementing those cuts will be tempted to under-resource the human override team or cut it entirely. Quality of service isn't the priority.
- icebraining 8y ago
  The exact same argument can be made to those criticizing the use of automation: it doesn't matter, because that pressure means it will be used anyway. And the whole discussion becomes meaningless.
  - hueving 8y ago
    No, when economic systems pressure companies into cutting corners, it's completely fair to criticize the situation. "Think of all of the money people are saving by allowing businesses to refuse service to disabled people." A system with massive net positive social utility does not alone justify injustice for a few.
mtgx 8y ago
Another way to look at it is that an organization that is willing to automate everything for the sake of efficiency/profit is probably not too interested in "adding a lot more quality human support to compensate for that extreme automation". Chances are it wants to automate 100% (or at least 99.99%) of it jobs and will strive to achieve that, while considering any human cost as "friction" or inefficiency that needs to be eliminated.
bsder 8y ago
> On the other hand, a justice system which has most of the menial tasks automated might have more resources to do the important tasks well. Justice systems are always about exceptions. Computers handle exceptions EXTREMELY poorly. A justice system should be required to have a human on record for every action taken against another human being. The computers can be used to verify this, but they should not be allowed to be primary.

james_s_tayler 8y ago

I just finished reading The Secret Barrister and it already seems to be the case, at least in the UK, that if something is wrong you can't really clear it up.

olivermarks 8y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_the_Law_and_How_It%27s_Broken https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_the_Law_and_How_It%... Thank you, I will read this

ryanmarsh 8y ago

This is something ordinary people who haven’t run afoul of the justice system cannot understand. It must be witnessed first hand to be comprehended. The justice system is a big boulder at the top of a mountain. Once an arrest or accusation sets in it motion, unless you are powerful and or wealthy, it will do what boulders do, it can do no different. It is not cognizant, it just is. It takes immense resources to stop or avoid this boulder. Resources far exceeding even the well-to-do often times. The system is there to win cases and incarcerate and my god does it do just that. Innocent or not, the system moves humans. Do not pray the jury hears your side, pray you never get so much as accused. Look up the conviction rates for district attorneys across the country. You tell me, does that look justice?

ams6110 8y ago
I'd expect conviction rates to be pretty high. It means they are only bringing charges when they have strong evidence. If conviction rates were low I'd be asking why that prosecutor was wasting his time on cases he can't win.
- ryanmarsh 8y ago
  It means they are only bringing charges when they have strong evidence We would hope so. It could also mean far worse things are happening. We’ve all seen documentaries and news shows of people wrongly convicted. Why do we think the only incidences are the ones reported. I’ve watched detectives lie on the stand when a guilty verdict was already in hand. Why do that? How do they treat the innocent if that’s how they act when the facts of the case are enough to convict?

eloff 8y ago

This sounds like a lot of people's experiences with Equifax and Transunion. They make a mistake and it can take you a decade and a lot of money and effort to clear your name.

baddox 8y ago

I don’t know how to compare the US justice system to Google support, but the former is already notoriously difficult, expensive, inefficient, and inaccessible to large groups of people.

redthrowaway 8y ago

If you're big enough, Google provides excellent support. I was once responsible for a product that generated $30k/month in adsense revenue. It got banned due to adult content and my attempts to clean everything up weren't entirely successful. I ended up on chat with someone from adsense and they essentially held my hand for an hour as we found and removed every bit of porn in the product.

lostgame 8y ago

Okay, I think I can do one worse. Imagine if the justice system was like Apple's App Store acceptance/rejection system. Sorry for putting that in your head, y'all.

slyall 8y ago

A classic short story along this line is: Computers Don't Argue by Gordon R. Dickson A man has a complaint with his book club, but a series of errors escalate things alarmingly. The Wikipedia article has the whole plot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computers_Don%27t_Argue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computers_Don%27t_Argue

ryacko 8y ago
Or have the actual story: https://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=133 https://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=133
- jammygit 8y ago
  I feel weird about reading sci fi for free online. I feel like its unnatural and that it should come from used bookstores like god intended. I miss used bookstores, most of the big ones in my city have closed down
  - 8bitsrule 8y ago
    According to one online source, 'jammygit', you bought several Phil Dick novels at one of those used bookstores. Maybe that's why you feel 'weird'. I also regret the loss of so many used bookstores ... one of my favorite haunts. We can only try to visit the survivors much more often.
    - modzu 8y ago
      PKD's electric sheep was one of the first things i read "online" -- via BBS baby
- 8bitsrule 8y ago
  Oh my. I've read that story in the distant past. It was merely hilarious at that time. Today I was grimacing.

delbel 8y ago

This is literally the plot to the 1971 George Lucas sci-fi film THX 1138, down to the detail: "set in a dystopian future in which the populace is controlled through android police ... ."

brailsafe 8y ago

Google has support?

013a 8y ago

The purpose of computers is to enhance the ability of humans who have a job to accomplish, not do their job for them. If we don't figure this out as a society, we're doomed.

CogitoCogito 8y ago
Also the operators of a computer system should always be held responsible for any errors of that system. Mistakes by the system are your* mistakes. Any decisions made by the system must be explained by you. All costs rectifying those mistakes must be bared by you. *Obviously "you" means your organization, company, etc. and not necessarily some random office clerk.
sgustard 8y ago
"I predict that within fifteen years, AI will be able to replace 40 to 50 percent of jobs in the US." - Kai-Fu Lee

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

dmix 8y ago

The justice system is hardly automated. It's one of the least automated systems (ie, employing technology to reduce inefficiencies) of all industry 'niches' in the western world. Law enforcement might be using technology to dole out punishment/fines more efficiently, but the actual justice system that civilians have to deal with after getting fined or charged (ie, the world of lawyers, judges, and courts) is extremely backwards in their use of humans, paper, fax machines, etc. Not using even basic technology. The justice system is famous for the extreme slowness for the amount of human-time required in processing of even the most basic small details. By eliminating the amount of human-time (by a hired lawyer or oneself) that each person has to engage the systems (for example by missing work or paying with money instead of time) would do a lot of help the poor better deal with the justice system - and get better and fairer treatment by the system.

jammygit 8y ago

on a tangent... "caught in a Kafkaesque nightmare" I've been meaning to read kafka one day. Is there a title in specific you would recommend to start with?

maxxxxx 8y ago
I don't know how good the English translations are but I would look at "the Trial" or "Metamorphosis". This is a good short story: https://genius.com/Franz-kafka-before-the-law-annotated https://genius.com/Franz-kafka-before-the-law-annotated