4 ms·

Similar category: Merlin Bird ID [1]. Uses audio to identify the birds around you. [1] https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/ https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/

derwiki 8mo ago
Aaand if you like birds, Listers documentary is a lot of fun https://youtu.be/zl-wAqplQAo https://youtu.be/zl-wAqplQAo
- JumpCrisscross 8mo ago
  The funny thing is I got into birds because of the app. I hike alone often. Identifying the bird and then challenging myself to identify it correctly from memory going forward (before double checking with the app) is a fun game that draws one into the environment. Then, once you remember the bird (or, in my case, whatever nickname I came up with) you start learning and remembering facts about the bird.
  - xandrius 8mo ago
    Yeah, birding can be such fun once you have a small repertoire of birds under your belt. Some people get that from their culture or family but I didn't, so made a little game to get me going. It's so satisfying to hear/see a bird and actually have a chance at getting it right
- ajkjk 8mo ago
  Even if you don't like birds... It's one of my favorite things I've ever watched.
- bix6 8mo ago
  Best movie of the year hands down
- ajitid 8mo ago
  What a great documentary! Loved the pace of the documentary and the mix of visuals. Thanks for sharing.
bobbiechen 8mo ago
I'm a big fan of Merlin and learning more about its development changed my perspective on software development! I wrote about that here: https://digitalseams.com/blog/what-birdsong-and-backends-can-teach-us-about-magic https://digitalseams.com/blog/what-birdsong-and-backends-can...
- bikelang 8mo ago
  Thanks for sharing this. I love Merlin but never knew how they got it to be so good. Blood, sweat, and tears - of course - as everything actually valuable and useful requires.
- nunez 8mo ago
  > The process of generating this data is labor intensive, because it requires sound ID experts to listen to each audio file carefully. Oh man. This is THE ONLY REASON why AI at scale works...and it's entirely powered by extremely repetitive classification done by people in third-world countries (for now; there are similar jobs in US and Canada for harder domains like math and law). It's definitely the biggest reason why autonomous driving works. (Cornell, who maintains Merlin, probably has students do it, though I know there is data crowdsourcing in the app too.) As far as I understand it, classification data is basically the Brent crude of the AI industry (well that and the datasets used for training LLMs). There was a great investigative article done by The Verge that built a piece around interviews of people at a data labelling center in Kenya and other African countries: https://www.theverge.com/features/23764584/ai-artificial-intelligence-data-notation-labor-scale-surge-remotasks-openai-chatbots https://www.theverge.com/features/23764584/ai-artificial-int.... It paid well for the area until the company that spun up these services decided to move operations to SEA to save on cost. I'll try and link to it if I can find it. Here are similar articles on this topic: - https://www.vice.com/en/article/china-ai-dominance-relies-on-young-data-labelers/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/china-ai-dominance-relies-on... - https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-66514287 https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-66514287 - https://old.reddit.com/r/ArtificialInteligence/comments/1r7qbbe/what_its_like_to_be_a_data_labeler_training_ai/ https://old.reddit.com/r/ArtificialInteligence/comments/1r7q... It's actually insane how sparingly this is discussed when talking about advancements in AI.
- 7mo ago
kiproping 8mo ago
There's Merlin and then there's Birdnet too https://birdnet.cornell.edu/ https://birdnet.cornell.edu/. Both by Cornell.
- dunham 8mo ago
  I've been using birdnet, but it seems to want an internet connection to do the identification and sometimes that is dicey when there is a bird that I want to identify. (Also birds seem to shut up around the time you get the app open.) I'm going to give Merlin a try - the app has UI to download the network for offline use.
  - rurp 8mo ago
    Requiring an internet connection for a nature app is absurd. As annoying as it is I get why a big tech company like Google fails at this sort of thing, many of their employees probably never leave a city and so the products always work well for them. But a nature app has no excuse, normal usage will get blocked by that all the time.
    - meta-meta 8mo ago
      That's what Merlin is for but it's a ~450mb install. BirdNet is only a ~30MB install and birds are everywhere, so what's wrong with having an online option for most people who spend most of their time within range of a cel tower?
  - tejtm 8mo ago
    birdnet pi or go run the model locally with an option to push observations back to Cornell https://www.birdweather.com/birdnetpi https://www.birdweather.com/birdnetpi https://github.com/tphakala/birdnet-go https://github.com/tphakala/birdnet-go
    - shellfishgene 8mo ago
      Tphakala recently also published a cli tool to process recordings, it can also use other models such as Google perch. https://github.com/tphakala/birda https://github.com/tphakala/birda
upcoming-sesame 8mo ago
Merlin is great for identifying birds, but I could never understand how to just post the information to the community for them to verify the observation. Compared to Seek / iNaturalist I find the uploading process complicated and I still have no idea how to do it.
nunez 8mo ago
Indispensable app. Works extremely well.

derwiki 8mo ago

Aaand if you like birds, Listers documentary is a lot of fun https://youtu.be/zl-wAqplQAo https://youtu.be/zl-wAqplQAo

JumpCrisscross 8mo ago
The funny thing is I got into birds because of the app. I hike alone often. Identifying the bird and then challenging myself to identify it correctly from memory going forward (before double checking with the app) is a fun game that draws one into the environment. Then, once you remember the bird (or, in my case, whatever nickname I came up with) you start learning and remembering facts about the bird.
- xandrius 8mo ago
  Yeah, birding can be such fun once you have a small repertoire of birds under your belt. Some people get that from their culture or family but I didn't, so made a little game to get me going. It's so satisfying to hear/see a bird and actually have a chance at getting it right
ajkjk 8mo ago
Even if you don't like birds... It's one of my favorite things I've ever watched.
bix6 8mo ago
Best movie of the year hands down
ajitid 8mo ago
What a great documentary! Loved the pace of the documentary and the mix of visuals. Thanks for sharing.

bobbiechen 8mo ago

I'm a big fan of Merlin and learning more about its development changed my perspective on software development! I wrote about that here: https://digitalseams.com/blog/what-birdsong-and-backends-can-teach-us-about-magic https://digitalseams.com/blog/what-birdsong-and-backends-can...

bikelang 8mo ago
Thanks for sharing this. I love Merlin but never knew how they got it to be so good. Blood, sweat, and tears - of course - as everything actually valuable and useful requires.
nunez 8mo ago
> The process of generating this data is labor intensive, because it requires sound ID experts to listen to each audio file carefully. Oh man. This is THE ONLY REASON why AI at scale works...and it's entirely powered by extremely repetitive classification done by people in third-world countries (for now; there are similar jobs in US and Canada for harder domains like math and law). It's definitely the biggest reason why autonomous driving works. (Cornell, who maintains Merlin, probably has students do it, though I know there is data crowdsourcing in the app too.) As far as I understand it, classification data is basically the Brent crude of the AI industry (well that and the datasets used for training LLMs). There was a great investigative article done by The Verge that built a piece around interviews of people at a data labelling center in Kenya and other African countries: https://www.theverge.com/features/23764584/ai-artificial-intelligence-data-notation-labor-scale-surge-remotasks-openai-chatbots https://www.theverge.com/features/23764584/ai-artificial-int.... It paid well for the area until the company that spun up these services decided to move operations to SEA to save on cost. I'll try and link to it if I can find it. Here are similar articles on this topic: - https://www.vice.com/en/article/china-ai-dominance-relies-on-young-data-labelers/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/china-ai-dominance-relies-on... - https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-66514287 https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-66514287 - https://old.reddit.com/r/ArtificialInteligence/comments/1r7qbbe/what_its_like_to_be_a_data_labeler_training_ai/ https://old.reddit.com/r/ArtificialInteligence/comments/1r7q... It's actually insane how sparingly this is discussed when talking about advancements in AI.
7mo ago

kiproping 8mo ago

There's Merlin and then there's Birdnet too https://birdnet.cornell.edu/ https://birdnet.cornell.edu/. Both by Cornell.

dunham 8mo ago
I've been using birdnet, but it seems to want an internet connection to do the identification and sometimes that is dicey when there is a bird that I want to identify. (Also birds seem to shut up around the time you get the app open.) I'm going to give Merlin a try - the app has UI to download the network for offline use.
- rurp 8mo ago
  Requiring an internet connection for a nature app is absurd. As annoying as it is I get why a big tech company like Google fails at this sort of thing, many of their employees probably never leave a city and so the products always work well for them. But a nature app has no excuse, normal usage will get blocked by that all the time.
  - meta-meta 8mo ago
    That's what Merlin is for but it's a ~450mb install. BirdNet is only a ~30MB install and birds are everywhere, so what's wrong with having an online option for most people who spend most of their time within range of a cel tower?
- tejtm 8mo ago
  birdnet pi or go run the model locally with an option to push observations back to Cornell https://www.birdweather.com/birdnetpi https://www.birdweather.com/birdnetpi https://github.com/tphakala/birdnet-go https://github.com/tphakala/birdnet-go
  - shellfishgene 8mo ago
    Tphakala recently also published a cli tool to process recordings, it can also use other models such as Google perch. https://github.com/tphakala/birda https://github.com/tphakala/birda

upcoming-sesame 8mo ago

Merlin is great for identifying birds, but I could never understand how to just post the information to the community for them to verify the observation. Compared to Seek / iNaturalist I find the uploading process complicated and I still have no idea how to do it.

nunez 8mo ago

Indispensable app. Works extremely well.