Media
Lauren Oldja, MSPH - Supervised Learning at the Movies
For those following along here or on my Twitter account it's no secret that I am currently enrolled at Metis in their 12-week data science bootcamp, which marries the structure of daily morning problem solving with highly self-guided and project-based afternoons/evenings/weekends. The expectations are high, and the deadlines are "intentionally unfair", giving the three months a hackathon-lite vibe. Some projects featured on this blog, this post included, accompany projects completed and presented for Metis. For this project I scraped Box Office Mojo in order to build a predictive linear regression model. At first blush, predicting domestic box office gross is hardly worthy of machine learning: instinctively we know it must be a function of increasing marketing and production budgets.
This Intelligent 3D Printer Is Building Big, Beautiful Structures
Imagine one day walking into a gorgeous structure--like LA's famous Walt Disney Concert Hall--only to discover it was designed by a computer system and constructed by automated robotic arms. Ai Build, a London-based startup, aims to pave the way to 3D printing on large scales. The company is equipping industrial-grade Kuka robotic arms with artificial intelligence and "3D printing guns" to 3D print large structures that focus on maximizing efficiency with labor and materials. Founder and CEO Daghan Cam dreamed up the technology while considering traditional commercial construction and wondering what a more efficient and automated process might look like. In October, the company partnered with engineering consulting firm Arup Engineers to debut the 3D printed "Daedalus Pavilion" at the GPU Technology Conference in Amsterdam.
The Consuming Fervor of "Arrival"
When aliens come, how will they get here? Well, unless they are sly infiltrators of the flesh, they will probably go for the kind of boastful, get-a-load-of-us craft that was immortalized by Douglas Adams in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." He wrote, "The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't." That was true of "Independence Day," and it is doubly true of "Arrival," in which a dozen mountainous ovoids--charcoal gray and rough to the touch, like a pumice stone--show up at various locations around Earth. Rather than land, the vessels suspend themselves in dignified fashion, with their tips facing downward and not quite touching the ground.
Can you judge a person by his or her face? Computers have begun to for the first time
Social psychologists have long known that humans make snap judgments about each other based on nothing more than the way we look and, in particular, our faces. We use these judgments to determine whether a new acquaintance is trustworthy or clever or dominant or sociable or humorous and so on. These decisions may or may not be right and are by no means objective, but they are consistent. Given the same face in the same conditions, people tend to judge it in the same way. And that raises an interesting possibility.
How Abbey Road got game: the invasion of the video-game soundtrack
Spill a glass of wine on the wooden floor at Abbey Road and the studio triggers an emergency procedure. In this, England's most storied recording venue, change is resisted at a molecular level – and not only because, in 2010, the government listed the building as a heritage site to ward off vampiric property developers. A few years ago, decorators varnished the floor of Studio Two, whose decor is somewhere between a 1950s prep school gym and a ballroom on the Titanic. The room's acoustic resonance, made famous on most of the Beatles' albums, had changed. The varnish was promptly chipped off, at vast expense.
Elon Musk: We Need Universal Income Because Robots Will Steal All the Jobs
Spacentrepreneur Elon Musk thinks we'll eventually need a basic universal income because of "automation." "People will have time to do other things, more complex things, more interesting things," he told CNBC. And then we gotta figure how we integrate with a world and future with a vast AI." "Ultimately, I think there has to be some improved symbiosis with digital super intelligence," the Tesla CEO said. What will happen if robots steal our jobs? It's a question that's been on the minds of both the proletariat and the bourgeoisie since the advent of artificial intelligence.
'Westworld' had a cool easter egg that you probably missed
Warning: The following contains light spoilers for episode 6 of Westworld. If you're a big fan of HBO's Westworld and also have a near photographic memory of the 1973 film of the same name (looking at you, 20 people!) you may have caught a cool easter egg on Sunday's episode. In a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, a decommissioned host appeared during Bernard's search through the lower levels. In case you aren't familiar with 1973's Westworld, the host Bernard's flashlight briefly touches looks exactly like Yul Brynner's broken killer robot character from that film. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Jonathan Nolan spoke briefly about the cameo.
How chatbots help with your marketing efforts
Marketing in the 2000s was dominated by search engine marketing and optimization (SEM and SEO). The early 2010s saw the rise of Facebook and social media marketing. Most recently, we've seen mobile marketing rise and plateau as users have stopped downloading new apps. Now, we are entering the era of messaging and chatbots. What is a "chatbot," you ask? Chatbots are computer programs that carry out conversations with people using a lightweight messaging app UI, language-based rules, or artificial intelligence.
BINARY - A Live-Action Sci-Fi Short Film
Binary is the story of a man who must decide between saving his artificially intelligent girlfriend or a human woman during a crucial space voyage, causing him to question what love really means. Binary will be a 20-minute, live-action short film. Ryker - Loyal and naive, Ryker grew up in the working class. When he falls in love with an artificially intelligent woman, Seline, he struggles with whether to prioritize his love or his fellow human. Seline - An advanced form of artificial intelligence, appearing human, Seline has been programmed with the capacity to love. She must convince Ryker and Natalie her love is as valuable as human love.
SoftBank's quarterly profit doubles on strong Japan results
SoftBank also sells the Pepper human-shaped companion robot for homes and businesses, and runs a solar energy business in Japan, highlighting a critical stance against nuclear energy that has spread since the 2011 Fukushima disaster. Its investment empire encompasses financial technology and ride-booking services.