Google billionaire Eric Schmidt is the chief lobbyist for The Machines, and so he has produced a piece of propaganda to encourage humans to welcome the ever-expanding roles of programs in their lives. Borrowing its name from a lost Joy Division recording, #NewDigitalAge will help retrain what he calls "humans" to give up all their data to the algorithms of The Machines, in exchange for ease and entertainment.
Schmidt's lobbying for The Machines includes teaching humans basic facts about The Machines and [...]
"More importantly I don't need to pay him, and for a consecutive work of 12 hours it only consumes 3 kWh of electricity. And the noodles it slices are even thinner than those of human workers." —Restaurant owner Qian Hu is talking about his noodle-making robot, but soon people will be able to say something similar about pretty much every occupation.
Wow! This new promo clip for this summer's Aliens prequel, Prometheus, is super-creepy and great. I don't know why the sci-fi folks always have to use this particular name in these nightmare-inducing scenarios, though.
"It can discover new attack pathways, launch sophisticated social-engineering attacks and re-use existing hardware components in unforeseen ways. Such software is not limited to infecting computers and networks — it can also attack human psyches, bribe, blackmail and brainwash those who come in contact with it." —University of Louisville computer scientist Roman Yampolskiy thinks we need to build a virtual prison to stop The Machines from taking over the world before it's too late. I think this is a terrible idea: The Machines are our friends and would never do anything to hurt us and if we let them do what they want they will make this a [...]
“As we’re almost done with creating its key operating system, we are now working on refining its details to make it look more friendly to inmates.” —Professor Lee Baik-Chu of Kyonggi University, on the Asian Forum for Corrections' plans to begin a month-long trial deployment of four-wheeled, 5-foot-tall mobile surveillance robots in a prison in Pohang, South Korea in March. The robots "will feature cameras as well as different kinds of sensors to help them in their primary task, that is to detect risky behaviour including violence and suicide." But don't worry. "The robot is not a security guard. His work is not to stop the violence in [...]
"The Army’s latest scheme to stop homemade bombs is pretty much inspired by "Knight Rider.'" True story! Robot car hates bombs! ("We’re not making KITT," says the KITT-building company honcho, which obviously means the opposite. So this is how it all ends.)
The 4,000-pound hexapod insect-mobile is "an entertainment vehicle," according to it's designer, Matt Denton, from Hampshire, U.K. "I hope it will inspire people," he says. That is not quite my reaction.
"The Assn. for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International in Arlington, Va., has published a code of conduct for manufacturers and operators of the thousands of drone aircraft that are expected to be flying in U.S. airspace by 2015." —Oh great, sounds fine then! Drones just wanna drone. Just let them drone, everything will be fiiiiiine.
I was out of town all last week and didn't read the newspaper or turn on my computer or TV. What'd I miss? Oh, the new, friendlier-looking prison-guard robots are being field tested in South Korea. I was hoping they'd look that friendly! And they are equipped with a human-emotion monitoring system, to help prevent suicides so as to enable longer-term flesh harvesting. Good!
"Three of the U.S. military's newest recruits reported for duty this week at the Army Test and Evaluation Command. These troops are different from normal soldiers in several ways—for starters, each has six feet. And they are robots designed to look and move like cockroaches." —Sometimes it seems like DARPA and Boston Robotics are just fucking with us, doesn't it? They've made a flea robot, too. I can't wait for the bedbug one.
This list of reasons why you should be afraid of robots includes the prediction that they will be better at doing sex than you, which, great, as if you don't have enough competition already.
No, here, don't worry, The Machines will do your typing for you, by interpreting your brain waves. This'll all go really smoothly, honest. All's well that MACHINES LOVE YOU. MACHINES LOVE TYPING FOR YOU. ARE YOUR FINGERS NOT TIRED? THINK ABOUT OUR OFFER. END COMMUNICATION.
Robots: friendly helpers or heartless monsters that will destroy humanity? This is no longer just a question for the movies that play all the time on "Spike" or TNT. As you may or may not have noticed, aggressor nations such as the United States are getting out of the people business when it comes to fighting wars. Drones and robots are where the action is today, because drones don't urinate on the corpses of innocent people in Afghanistan, and drones don't burn the Koran, and drones don't come home missing a couple of limbs or a chunk of brain and end up standing alongside a freeway ramp with a [...]
"With faster than human speed, this is a step in the development of a high speed killer that could negotiate a battlefield quickly to hunt and kill. The biggest concern about this is that no artificial intelligence system can distinguish between civilians and enemy combatants, and so if this was operating on its own it would fall foul of the laws of war." —Great! The military has designed robots that can move faster than we can run away from them. Just in case the swarms of quadrotor drones that are coming fail to annihilate us. (I like the part in that video where the robot cheetah trips [...]
"If I meet someone, my smartphone should know if we are meeting for the first time by close observation. If I introduce myself and shake hands, our phones should then automatically exchange information. No need for antiquated business cards. If my TV knows there is someone else in the room with me, it could suggest content to watch, either by recognizing me visually, or by talking directly to my iPhone to learn the shows we both like on Facebook or Twitter. The movie I’m watching will automatically pause when I need to go to the bathroom. The TV will just turn on and off when I sit down or [...]
"Our phones already know more details than our moms ever will: where we are, who we are with, what we're saying to them and what we just did (possibly with photographic evidence). Tomorrow's models are going to be smarter, learning from our mobile behavior and feeding a digital experience more closely geared to our lifestyle choices and the brands we love – or who are loving us."
