Introducing the AI Mirror Test, which very smart people keep failing – Great article from The Verge on AI and our tendency to anthropomorphize machines that mimic human behavior, even when we’re fully aware we’re talking to a machine, also known as the ELIZA effect.

AI chatbots like Bing and ChatGPT are entrancing users, but they’re just autocomplete systems trained on our own stories about superintelligent AI. That makes them software — not sentient.

A monkey looking into a mirror at its own reflection

Who’s that in the mirror?

Just like humans, these new AI chatbots at times seem very intelligent, and sometimes just outright stupid – but we should not forget these are just algorithmic responses and not a sign of any sentience. We are still a very long way from that point – if it ever will happen.

Source: Introducing the AI Mirror Test, which very smart people keep failing

Gallery Logo

Gallery Project logo

A small update after a long time: After my web host SDF.org changed the HTTP server from good old Apache to Nginx last year, the Gallery has been broken, mostly due to lack of support for user-specified Apache .htaccess and mod_rewrite rules in Nginx. Fortunately I’ve now gotten it sorted out with a little assistance from the SDF admins and the very helpful people at the Gallery3 mailing group. Some server configuration for PHP had to be changed, and it was actually just a pretty small fix.

The Gallery Project has been around since 2001, when I first installed it. Unfortunately the project’s been in hibernation since 2014, but lately there’s been an attempt to make it work on newer PHP versions and fix some bugs, called Gallery Revival, and the code is available on GitHub.

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This person does not exist – a random gallery of computer-generated faces, created with machine-learning algorithms called GANs. The technology to create these is very impressive, considering how realistic a lot of these look — and at the same kind of scary.

Computer-generated face

Computer-generated face

Of course scammers and other internet lowlifes have been using stolen or stock-image faces for a long time to add authenticity to fake social media profiles, this basically means that now they can just create random faces that will be very convincing, at least in most cases.

There are, at least for now, various ways to recognize fake AI-generated images by subtle hints, but the algorithms can only get better at this over time. Maybe recognizing these faces will be a necessary skill to have in times to come?

Related: Which face is real?

Bitcoin, cryptocurrency, blockchain—these things are huge, right? Still unsure if you should invest your time or money? Don’t know the difference between a Satoshi and a gigahash? Well, stock photography is here to help give us a sense of the inner workings, background, and the dos and don’ts of the bitcoin ecosystem.

Bitcoins are not for consumption!

Bitcoins are not for consumption!

Source: Bitcoin: A Stock Photo Cryptocurrency Primer – The Atlantic

The Internet Archive is always a source of awesome retro-computing goodies.

The Malware Museum is a collection of malware programs, usually viruses, that were distributed in the 1980s and 1990s on home computers. Once they infected a system, they would sometimes show animation or messages that you had been infected. Through the use of emulations, and additionally removing any destructive routines within the viruses, this collection allows you to experience virus infection of decades ago with safety.

Malware Example: KUKU.COM

Source: The Malware Museum : Free Software : Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

A couple of years old – but a very interesting story on NPR about the SDF community, where my site is hosted.

Before Facebook and MySpace transformed how we interact online, there was another kind of Internet: the SDF network, made up of users connecting via phone lines and code. Around the world, 30,000 computing enthusiasts still use that network today.

Source: In Noisy Digital Era, ‘Elegant’ Internet Still Thrives : NPR

My new Nokia 6230 came with a handsfree set with earbuds who were not as good as I had hoped, and I wanted to be able to use my own when listening to mp3 and radio. So I decided to do a little hack and install a standard 3.5mm headphone jack.

(Click on the image for a larger version)

(Click on the image for a larger version)

First I tried to do it on my own, but my skills with a soldering iron is not good at all, so I got a guy at a shop to do it cheap (100,- kr) for me. I think the result is great, and now I can use my nice Koss headphones with my mobile.