tptacek

12 ms·

301.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I often wonder whether computer programmer said these kinds of things about spreadsheets, and how mere office workers would never have the knowledge base to build serious programs with them. Remember, before Visicalc, every spreadsheet was
302.
by tptacek 2mo ago
You're trying to imagine rare valuable books and then fantasizing about AI companies destroying them, but what's actually happening here is that AI companies are acquiring, digitizing, and then pulping the instruction manuals to 1
303.
by tptacek 2mo ago
That would make sense as an argument if the natural endpoint of these copies was preservation, and AI was disrupting that. But the natural next step for virtually all these books is to be recycled, not preserved. Books are generally not pr
304.
by tptacek 2mo ago
The 404 story suggested that these are largely vanity press books and instruction manuals for things no longer sold. Implying that these books were almost certainly headed for the recycling center had the AI companies not snatched them up.
305.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I think people genuinely don't get that book destruction is like a pretty natural part of the book lifecycle.
306.
by tptacek 2mo ago
When you read "rare books", what are you thinking these are? The 404 article that spun this story up goes into more detail. These are like vanity press books. They're rare because nobody cares about them. The book industry a
307.
by tptacek 2mo ago
These stories are weird, because actual professional specialized book dealers pulp books by the millions . People keep pointing out, and it doesn't seem to sink in, that model trainers only have use for a single copy of a book. Even i
308.
by tptacek 2mo ago
To do what?
309.
by tptacek 2mo ago
It is obvious what the parent poster is saying, and it's substantively wrong. Give someone a table saw and they're essentially no closer to being a woodworker. It's tricky to use a table saw (trickier still to use it safely).
310.
by tptacek 2mo ago
So far the closest analogy I've come up with to coding agents is a 3D printer. Captures the amount of effort and the quality of the outputs.
311.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Not for you! You have to actually know how to do that, and physically push the stock through the blade. If you know zero about a table saw, you're more likely to turn a piece of wood into a projectile than to cross-cut it accurately. A
312.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Walk into a fine dining restaurant kitchen and count the number of chefs hats you see.
313.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Wait: a calculator doesn't make you a mathematician because you have to know math to get the calculator to do anything. A pencil does even less for you. You can't say any of that about AI.
314.
by tptacek 2mo ago
The hat : chef analogy is even less apposite than the table saw! At least the table saw serves an important function in that trade.
315.
by tptacek 2mo ago
It doesn't, it's just that people keep making comparisons between AI and basic tools of specific trades, but none of those tools work the way AI does. (I mean, I guess as soon as you start whacking things together with a hammer, y
316.
by tptacek 2mo ago
In case you yourself do not own a table saw, I should point out that table saws don't rip, cut, or mill stock for you. It's like saying "buying a hammer doesn't make you a carpenter".
317.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Among other reasons, one doesn't become a writer by owning a typewriter because typewriters don't write for you.
318.
by tptacek 2mo ago
One of the reasons so many people believe Swartz faced 35 years in prison is that any attempt to correct the record is met by responses like this. Ironically, you're doing the work of the prosecutors for them: this is the whole reason
319.
by tptacek 2mo ago
We're not talking about Steve Albini, Ian MacKaye, or even Bob Mould. We're comparing Pearl Jam to Nirvana --- artists on Epic and Geffen. If you knew who SST Records was, you believed everyone was a sellout, including everyone on
320.
by tptacek 2mo ago
If you had every Backstreet Boys CD when you were 5, you are probably not a reliable narrator of the zeitgeist of Michael Jackson in the early 1980s. :)
321.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I don't think it matters much for the argument, which is valid (or not) regardless of whether you get the precise facts about the Swartz prosecution right, but Swartz was not facing 35 years. That's the statutory maximum sentence
322.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I was alert to popular culture by the time Thriller happened and I don't recall anybody thinking Michael Jackson was a "sellout". Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson did not one but two duets together.
323.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I have a problem with artists doing commerce under the guise of art. I listen, I read, and I watch because I want to inhabit, even if just for a moment, the mind of another human. I want to feel what it’s like to be them, and in so doing,
324.
by tptacek 2mo ago
This is unbelievably good work, thank you for writing it!
325.
by tptacek 2mo ago
In theory. Cards on the table, my prior on this is that these kinds of "OCR" errors are in fact very rare. I think that because we did a deep dive on every car curbed by a Flock camera here, as part of the process that led to us e
326.
by tptacek 2mo ago
I don't think this kind of metadiscussion is productive on these kinds of threads, sorry. Just a personal preference to avoid it as much as possible.
327.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Right, the "OCR" issue here is what I'm interested in --- Flock's vision models just straight-up making mistakes. There's a whole other issue of police not being well-trained in how to use these things, which leads
328.
by tptacek 2mo ago
If you want to make the argument that all cameras are problematic, I won't necessarily agree, but it's not the thing I'm asking about. One problem in these discussions is that it's virtually impossible to have a conversa
329.
by tptacek 2mo ago
The third of these is exactly what I'm looking for: a case where a Flock camera was off by one letter, and mismatched a car as stolen when it wasn't. The driver wasn't arrested, but being stopped for a stolen vehicle is terri
330.
by tptacek 2mo ago
Thanks! Reading now.

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