3 ms·
Some funny anecdotes / tricks I have heard about to defeat or detect cargo cult copying or cargo cult approaches: 1. Before our age of GPS maps and precision
by supernova87a 6y ago
Some funny anecdotes / tricks I have heard about to defeat or detect cargo cult copying or cargo cult approaches:
1. Before our age of GPS maps and precision surveying, some map makers used to purposely put in little artificial defects into their roads or neighborhoods (non functional little things). This was so that someone who couldn't be bothered to do their own survey and copied the map exactly would not know the difference and reveal themselves by the defect (and be sued for copyright, etc). Such as little hooks on ends of roads, or even fake small villages in the middle of nowhere.
In fact, I recall one story where a village actually became real after enough companies had copied a certain map issued by someone who had put in one such fake village to defeat copying, and a general store named itself after the place, thinking it must be real.
2. When people plagiarize code without understanding it, leaving in non-functional variables or loops that the original author either didn't delete or put in as a trap.
- Sniffnoy 6y agoYou're thinking of Agloe, New York: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agloe,_New_York https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agloe,_New_York However, it never really became a real town or anything. There was an Agloe General Store there, but that seems to have been it.
- parsecs 6y agoBeat me to the reply!
- supernova87a 6y agoBeat you by a parsec!
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- pico303 6y agohttps://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2014/03/18/290236647/an-imaginary-town-becomes-real-then-not-true-story https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2014/03/18/290236647/a...
- _Microft 6y agoThe name of this is "trap street" if someone wants to search for it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trap_street https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trap_street
- colineartheta 6y agoLand Surveyor here. I have no idea where you got the impression that surveyors introduced artificial defects in the past, but this is flat wrong. Cartographers, who make maps at incredibly large scales, sure, occasionally. But “precision surveying” vastly preceded GPS (which...is still nowhere near our most precise instrument) and nearly all of the worlds infrastructure was laid out by incredibly skilled and competent individuals who would have been risking their livelihood had they done what you’re implying. Survey maps aren’t “copyrighted”.
- eigenket 6y agoThe Ordnance Survey in the UK won £20 million from another map maker (AA) by showing that AA maps contain "fingerprints" the OS includes in its maps. According to the OS these tend not to be significant mistakes but small changes like the width of roads and the like.
- tingle 6y agoSome map makers seem to have indulged in this for fun: For Decades, Cartographers Have Been Hiding Covert Illustrations Inside of Switzerland’s Official Maps https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/for-decades-cartographers-have-been-hiding-covert-illustrations-inside-of-switzerlands-official-maps/ https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/for-decades-cartographers-have-...