6 ms·

HN: "delete Facebook" Also HN: "show your face to this random site so an algorithm can tell you if you're hot or not"

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Timpy 6y ago
When they asked for webcam permission I instinctively checked to make sure my webcam was unplugged. Having an algorithm compliment your face is like having a horoscope tell you "You're loyal to fault and you're the kind of person that has tons of friends but you value your closest relationships the most..." etc.
- jeffnv 6y ago
  It didn't compliment my face!
ForHackernews 6y ago
I mean, it's an EU-funded academic site designed to raise awareness of privacy issues, so I'm inclined to believe them when they say they aren't keeping any of this data. Maybe it's because programmers tend to think categorically, but I find HN frequently has this problem where people are freaking out like "why is it okay when Mozilla does X but you don't want Google to do X?!" as though we're supposed to treat every question as some sort of sui generis scenario divorced from all history and context. History matters, context matters. I (generally) trust academics and democratically-elected governments, and I (generally) distrust giant ad-tech companies and authoritarian states.
- unityByFreedom 6y ago
  Context mattering has nothing to do with sharing your face with a random site that claims to be supported by "The EU". This is a site made by one guy, not the EU.
  - victords 6y ago
    Also, the EU is far from being this "digital warrior" some claim to be.
  - offtop5 6y ago
    Grad students working on Deep learning projects need to get data from somewhere.
  - ForHackernews 6y ago
    Then I guess it says something negative about today's internet that I trust some random guy a lot more than I trust Facebook or Google and their hordes of lawyers. If he says he's not collecting my data, I'm inclined to believe him. If Google says they won't misuse my data, I assume that comes with 200 pages of legalese loopholes to let them do whatever they want. I don't think I'm wrong, either.
    - Shared404 6y ago
      I hate that I have to feel agreement with this. Edit { Also, for those who are really concerned, I did test going to the landing page and disconnecting from the internet. It still worked, which leads me to believe the creator was in fact telling the truth. }
  - socialcooling 6y ago
    Creator here. The project was created as part of my role as artist within the Sherpa consortium. It's a Horizon2020 research project whose goal is to figure out what Europeans believe are the biggest issues around AI that we'll experience in 2025. Most of the other partners are universities, and I'm the lucky one who gets to translate what we learn into art pieces. Learn more about Sherpa here: https://www.project-sherpa.eu/ https://www.project-sherpa.eu/ All the other works I've created / am creating for Sherpa can be found here: https://www.sherpapieces.eu/ https://www.sherpapieces.eu/ Besides working as an artist I also work as a privacy designer, which means I specialise in creating things/products that protect privacy. This website was a very cool challenge to build, a testament to the power of javascript.
- raxxorrax 6y ago
  Putting all those images on a pillory on some marketplaces would certainly raise awareness for privacy.
turbinerneiter 6y ago
The Joke is the line that says: "Read terms: NO - Normal (88%)" Gave me a chuckle. We are so used to shitty TOS, cookie banners and all kinds of BS that we learned to just click them away.
- Shared404 6y ago
  I did read the TOS, but I have cookies disabled so it still said NO. I suspect that most of the people who do read the TOS probably also have cookies disabled, and therefore also were not counted.
  - socialcooling 6y ago
    That's very strange. It doesn't use cookies at all. I know because I built it :-)
    - NikolaeVarius 6y ago
      Can confirm.
    - Shared404 6y ago
      How unusual. I did follow the link from the TOS to the application. Would you like me to try again/do anything else to help debug? Edit: turning on noprocrast because I have work to get done. I'll check back in an hour or so.
      - socialcooling 6y ago
        That would be great actually. I've enabled debug mode. Add ?debug to the end of the url to get a peak under the engine. So: https://www.hownormalami.eu/?debug https://www.hownormalami.eu/?debug
        Shared404 6y ago
        I went and took another look, it turns out it did work properly, it was just that I read the UI wrong the first time. Sorry for the false alarm, I should've done better checking first. Edit: See other comment
raxxorrax 6y ago
Thought the same myself. I am not that old, but still optimistic about the challenge of never uploading an image of myself to the net. I am on pics uploaded by others sadly.
Shared404 6y ago
I thought the same. I read the TOS, they said it was all local, so I let the page load and then disconnected internet. It didn't seem to cause any problems.
- unityByFreedom 6y ago
  So? A site like this could still send data when internet is on. Or the code could change at a later date.
  - Shared404 6y ago
    I was more referring to the fact that it's possible to use it completely offline after the initial load, allowing you to use the app without risking any data leaving your machine. That being said, I did talk to the author a little bit, and am inclined to trust him.
  - socialcooling 6y ago
    Technically. But as a European I'd already be in a lot of trouble for breaking the law, since the website promises to not collect personal data. What you can do is check the javascript code for any 'http'. So open https://www.hownormalami.eu/main.js https://www.hownormalami.eu/main.js and then do CTRL-F and type in 'http'. See if any of the things you find seem to call home. Also scan over the code visually to check for any obfuscated code patterns which could hide additional instances of data transmission. In this case you won't find any shenanigans. In general I applaud your critical stance.
disown 6y ago
HN: "delete Facebook" Also HN: "love microsoft", "love apple" ... It's almost like there paid PR campaigns sweeping across social media. It's almost like there is a switch that gets flipped and all of a sudden you get "google is evil" spam. Then that gets turned off and another switch gets turned on and you get "facebook is evil". It's almost like much of news, traditional media and now social media are just platforms of PR campaigns. Hey, how great is Go, Rust, VSCode, etc? I wonder how much of the enthusiasm is organic and how much of it is manufactured. And remember guys, centralization is evil, but lets all move our code to github now that it is in microsoft's safe hands.
- sellyme 6y ago
  > It's almost like there paid PR campaigns sweeping across social media. Alternatively it's almost like Microsoft made a concerted effort to stop being the biggest scumbags in the entire industry and started doing some nice things, and people adjusted their opinions based on new evidence. Not that anyone is saying we should "love" them, but maybe we can stop referring to them as "Micro$oft" now. Not everything has to be some giant conspiracy. Microsoft are simply being less evil than they were two decades ago. Google eschewed "Don't be evil" in favour of "Try to be less evil than Oracle, but beyond that don't worry too much". The "switch" that got flipped was the actions of those entities. (As for Apple, I strongly disagree with your take. I've seen almost nothing but negative sentiment towards Apple for years now, even from former fanboys)
  - disown 6y ago
    > Alternatively it's almost like Microsoft made a concerted effort to stop being the biggest scumbags in the entire industry and started doing some nice things, and people adjusted their opinions based on new evidence. What evidence? Microsoft has been going more towards the "facebook" route with their move to turn the windows OS into a data collecting platform. And their "open source" move is filled with "telemetry". > Not everything has to be some giant conspiracy. Here comes those "conspiracy" talk. Everybody and their grandmother uses "conspiracy" as an argument against things they disagree with. I didn't say it was conspiracy. That corporations have PR campaigns isn't new. As a matter of fact, the founder of the site you are on wrote about it. http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html To imply otherwise would be a conspiracy. > (As for Apple, I strongly disagree with your take. I've seen almost nothing but negative sentiment towards Apple for years now, even from former fanboys) You've seen nothing but negative sentiment about apple? Where? Here, they are mostly championed as the "anti-facebook". But maybe we are reading different threads.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

When they asked for webcam permission I instinctively checked to make sure my webcam was unplugged. Having an algorithm compliment your face is like having a horoscope tell you "You're loyal to fault and you're the kind of person that has tons of friends but you value your closest relationships the most..." etc.

jeffnv 6y ago
It didn't compliment my face!

ForHackernews 6y ago

I mean, it's an EU-funded academic site designed to raise awareness of privacy issues, so I'm inclined to believe them when they say they aren't keeping any of this data. Maybe it's because programmers tend to think categorically, but I find HN frequently has this problem where people are freaking out like "why is it okay when Mozilla does X but you don't want Google to do X?!" as though we're supposed to treat every question as some sort of sui generis scenario divorced from all history and context. History matters, context matters. I (generally) trust academics and democratically-elected governments, and I (generally) distrust giant ad-tech companies and authoritarian states.

unityByFreedom 6y ago
Context mattering has nothing to do with sharing your face with a random site that claims to be supported by "The EU". This is a site made by one guy, not the EU.
- victords 6y ago
  Also, the EU is far from being this "digital warrior" some claim to be.
- offtop5 6y ago
  Grad students working on Deep learning projects need to get data from somewhere.
- ForHackernews 6y ago
  Then I guess it says something negative about today's internet that I trust some random guy a lot more than I trust Facebook or Google and their hordes of lawyers. If he says he's not collecting my data, I'm inclined to believe him. If Google says they won't misuse my data, I assume that comes with 200 pages of legalese loopholes to let them do whatever they want. I don't think I'm wrong, either.
  - Shared404 6y ago
    I hate that I have to feel agreement with this. Edit { Also, for those who are really concerned, I did test going to the landing page and disconnecting from the internet. It still worked, which leads me to believe the creator was in fact telling the truth. }
- socialcooling 6y ago
  Creator here. The project was created as part of my role as artist within the Sherpa consortium. It's a Horizon2020 research project whose goal is to figure out what Europeans believe are the biggest issues around AI that we'll experience in 2025. Most of the other partners are universities, and I'm the lucky one who gets to translate what we learn into art pieces. Learn more about Sherpa here: https://www.project-sherpa.eu/ https://www.project-sherpa.eu/ All the other works I've created / am creating for Sherpa can be found here: https://www.sherpapieces.eu/ https://www.sherpapieces.eu/ Besides working as an artist I also work as a privacy designer, which means I specialise in creating things/products that protect privacy. This website was a very cool challenge to build, a testament to the power of javascript.
raxxorrax 6y ago
Putting all those images on a pillory on some marketplaces would certainly raise awareness for privacy.

turbinerneiter 6y ago

The Joke is the line that says: "Read terms: NO - Normal (88%)" Gave me a chuckle. We are so used to shitty TOS, cookie banners and all kinds of BS that we learned to just click them away.

Shared404 6y ago
I did read the TOS, but I have cookies disabled so it still said NO. I suspect that most of the people who do read the TOS probably also have cookies disabled, and therefore also were not counted.
- socialcooling 6y ago
  That's very strange. It doesn't use cookies at all. I know because I built it :-)
  - NikolaeVarius 6y ago
    Can confirm.
  - Shared404 6y ago
    How unusual. I did follow the link from the TOS to the application. Would you like me to try again/do anything else to help debug? Edit: turning on noprocrast because I have work to get done. I'll check back in an hour or so.
    - socialcooling 6y ago
      That would be great actually. I've enabled debug mode. Add ?debug to the end of the url to get a peak under the engine. So: https://www.hownormalami.eu/?debug https://www.hownormalami.eu/?debug
      - Shared404 6y ago
        I went and took another look, it turns out it did work properly, it was just that I read the UI wrong the first time. Sorry for the false alarm, I should've done better checking first. Edit: See other comment

raxxorrax 6y ago

Thought the same myself. I am not that old, but still optimistic about the challenge of never uploading an image of myself to the net. I am on pics uploaded by others sadly.

Shared404 6y ago

I thought the same. I read the TOS, they said it was all local, so I let the page load and then disconnected internet. It didn't seem to cause any problems.

unityByFreedom 6y ago
So? A site like this could still send data when internet is on. Or the code could change at a later date.
- Shared404 6y ago
  I was more referring to the fact that it's possible to use it completely offline after the initial load, allowing you to use the app without risking any data leaving your machine. That being said, I did talk to the author a little bit, and am inclined to trust him.
- socialcooling 6y ago
  Technically. But as a European I'd already be in a lot of trouble for breaking the law, since the website promises to not collect personal data. What you can do is check the javascript code for any 'http'. So open https://www.hownormalami.eu/main.js https://www.hownormalami.eu/main.js and then do CTRL-F and type in 'http'. See if any of the things you find seem to call home. Also scan over the code visually to check for any obfuscated code patterns which could hide additional instances of data transmission. In this case you won't find any shenanigans. In general I applaud your critical stance.

disown 6y ago

HN: "delete Facebook" Also HN: "love microsoft", "love apple" ... It's almost like there paid PR campaigns sweeping across social media. It's almost like there is a switch that gets flipped and all of a sudden you get "google is evil" spam. Then that gets turned off and another switch gets turned on and you get "facebook is evil". It's almost like much of news, traditional media and now social media are just platforms of PR campaigns. Hey, how great is Go, Rust, VSCode, etc? I wonder how much of the enthusiasm is organic and how much of it is manufactured. And remember guys, centralization is evil, but lets all move our code to github now that it is in microsoft's safe hands.

sellyme 6y ago
> It's almost like there paid PR campaigns sweeping across social media. Alternatively it's almost like Microsoft made a concerted effort to stop being the biggest scumbags in the entire industry and started doing some nice things, and people adjusted their opinions based on new evidence. Not that anyone is saying we should "love" them, but maybe we can stop referring to them as "Micro$oft" now. Not everything has to be some giant conspiracy. Microsoft are simply being less evil than they were two decades ago. Google eschewed "Don't be evil" in favour of "Try to be less evil than Oracle, but beyond that don't worry too much". The "switch" that got flipped was the actions of those entities. (As for Apple, I strongly disagree with your take. I've seen almost nothing but negative sentiment towards Apple for years now, even from former fanboys)
- disown 6y ago
  > Alternatively it's almost like Microsoft made a concerted effort to stop being the biggest scumbags in the entire industry and started doing some nice things, and people adjusted their opinions based on new evidence. What evidence? Microsoft has been going more towards the "facebook" route with their move to turn the windows OS into a data collecting platform. And their "open source" move is filled with "telemetry". > Not everything has to be some giant conspiracy. Here comes those "conspiracy" talk. Everybody and their grandmother uses "conspiracy" as an argument against things they disagree with. I didn't say it was conspiracy. That corporations have PR campaigns isn't new. As a matter of fact, the founder of the site you are on wrote about it. http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html To imply otherwise would be a conspiracy. > (As for Apple, I strongly disagree with your take. I've seen almost nothing but negative sentiment towards Apple for years now, even from former fanboys) You've seen nothing but negative sentiment about apple? Where? Here, they are mostly championed as the "anti-facebook". But maybe we are reading different threads.