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Comment randomocity (Score 1) 156

... is not a word. Author of the original article is a moron for writing it, and Editor David is a moron for repeating it. Yet another sign that the "tech press" is mostly comprised of clueless mopes who held unspecified "IT jobs" before deciding that they wanted to write ignorant bullshit on the internet for a living.

Submission + - Facebook AI Labs Recruiting: Part of Academia's Poaching Problem or Solution?

theodp writes: Among other things, a 2015 Google Research post blamed tech's woeful diversity numbers on a "tiny pipeline of diverse students" caused by the "lack of capacity and faculty in CS departments to handle the increased number of enrollments and majors in CS" (Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also decried the number of CS grads in 2016). Perhaps that, plus the current swirl of questions around the way Facebook has dealt with misinformation and the personal data of its users, may help explain why a NY Times story that raised questions about Facebook's recruiting of university staffers for its AI labs in cities with prominent universities seemed to strike a raw nerve with The Social Network. "As it builds these labs," wrote the NYT's Cade Metz, "Facebook is adding to pressure on universities and nonprofit A.I. research operations, which are already struggling to retain professors and other employees." The expansion, Metz adds, is a blow for Carnegie Mellon in particular, which in 2015 had Uber poach 40 researchers from the university’s robotics lab. UW CS prof Dan Weld also voiced concern about Facebook’s drive. “It is worrisome that they are eating the seed corn," said Weld. "If we lose all our faculty, it will be hard to keep preparing the next generation of researchers.” Taking issue with the criticism, Facebook chief AI scientist Yann LeCun fired back with a post that blasted the NYT story and threw other tech companies under the bus. "This NYT piece by Cade Metz erroneously qualifies this evolution as a 'brain drain' from academia," wrote LeCun. "But Facebook is careful not to deplete universities from their best faculty, by making it easy to maintain sizeable research and teaching activities in their academic labs. In fact, making these part-time splits possible is precisely the reason why we have been establishing labs in New York, Paris, Montréal, Tel Aviv, and now Seattle and Pittsburgh. It is the proximity to leading universities with talented faculty, and the existence of a local talent pool that attract us. Unlike others, we work with universities to find suitable arrangements and do not hire away large numbers of faculty into full-time positions bottled up behind a wall of non-disclosure agreements. We contribute to local ecosystem."

Comment BeauHD and msmash (Score 2) 109

Look at the last 15 articles on the front page. These guys are pimping every article coming out of the verge, guardian, vice, recode and nbc. Only a couple of them have an actual submitter, and in each case it's "an anonymous reader". There are of course 10+ websites to choose from covering every one of these topics.

Enough with the leftist tech site circlejerk.

Submission + - SPAM: The Air Force Turned Off GPS To Rehearse a War Without It

schwit1 writes: The U.S. military is worryingly dependent on GPS. Our global positioning satellites tell planes where they are, provide targeting info for smart weapons, and support communication and navigation systems. But in a war with a tech-advanced adversary—think China, Russia, or Iran—GPS could become a big liability because it could be jammed, spoofed, or outright destroyed.

So how does the U.S. Air Force train for such a scenario? Simple—just turn it off.

Red Flag is the Air Force’s top air war training exercise, bringing together USAF fighter, bomber, tanker, and ISR squadrons with select allies for coordinated training over the 5,000 square-mile Nevada Test and Training Range (NTTR). For Red Flag 2018, which kicked off last week and will run through February 16, the Air Force will black out GPS, forcing aircrews to execute strike missions without their familiar satellite-based guide.

Link to Original Source

Submission + - King of Kong Billy Mitchell Stripped Of Donkey Kong Record For Emulator Cheating (hothardware.com)

MojoKid writes: More drama is unfolding in the ultra-competitive retro arcade gaming scene. Billy Mitchell, the arcade legend who appeared as a central character opposite Steve Wiebe in the documentary The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, has been accused of cheating his way into the record books for high scores in Donkey Kong. As a result, he's now been stripped of his 1.062 million score on the Donkey Kong Forums. Mitchell was the first person to crack 1 million points in Donkey Kong. That was more than a decade ago. Since then, he has been surpassed by several other gamers, with Mitchell's 1.062 million run occupying the No. 20 spot on the Donkey Kong leaderboard. Despite not holding the No. 1 spot, Mitchell is perhaps the most recognizable name on the list. However, the legitimacy of his score was called into question, and ultimately determined by Donkey Kong high score judge Jeremy "Xelnia" Young to have been obtained by cheating. Young laid out a body of evidence that seems to prove Mitchell recorded several of his high scores on the open source arcade emulator MAME, though he claimed his scores were obtained on an original arcade cabinet, and therefore were not subject to same strict authentication requirements. Young says. "It's possible they were recorded in one shot. Given the play style in Billy's videos, it's more likely that vanilla MAME's INP recording feature was abused." Twin Galaxies, which recently stripped Todd Rogers of all his high scores, after it was determined his high score in the Atari 2600 game Dragster is impossible to achieve, weighed in on the matter. Twin Galaxies is in the process of fully reviewing the compelling evidence provided by Jeremy Young to support his current score dispute case against Billy Mitchell's Donkey Kong score. We will do this thoroughly and impartially."

Submission + - Microsoft Paying PTA Groups $1,000 to Host a Minecraft Coding Party in Schools

theodp writes: In partnership with Microsoft, National PTA will award $1,000 to local PTAs that host a STEM + Families Tech Night at their schools. Bringing students and families together to either learn exciting new Minecraft coding skills or to build a robotic finger, the announcement explains, will "empower families to support student success and fill a critical gap in STEM education." From the application: "The 2018 National PTA STEM + Families Tech Grants sponsored by Microsoft, will award $1,000 to 35 local PTAs to host a STEM + Families Tech Night in the spring of 2018. This Tech Night event will bring students and families together to either learn exciting new Minecraft coding skills or to build a robotic finger (two different program models). National PTA will provide you with all the support and training necessary to host a successful STEM + Families Tech Night. No prior computer or technology experience needed! Your PTA makes sure all families and students are welcomed to the event, coordinates the student and family technology experience, and arranges for food and prizes. NOTE: Your PTA must be able to host an event at your school in March, April, May, or June 2018 in order to receive this grant." So, will this help Microsoft in its efforts to regain lost ground in the classroom? Or will Microsoft be outmaneuvered by Google, who ABC's Nightline reported Thursday has enlisted Chance the Rapper to help it push coding into classrooms.

Comment The Verge (Score 3, Insightful) 449

Exactly the kind of bullshit article I've come to expect from The Verge, as they continue to push far-left clickbait in a desperate attempt to remain relevant. They're approaching the level of BuzzFeed at this point. What's incredible is that anyone continues to pay attention to the ham-fisted Trump condemnations that are now the bread and butter of these publications, and apparently the only kind of article they're capable to producing. Online journalism has become so lazy it's almost unbelievable.

Comment Re:There is harassed and HARASSED (Score 1) 148

So people should dial down or outright suppress their criticisms because a possibility exists that some of their more overzealous followers will harass the target of that criticism? Sounds good Amimojo, I'll be waiting for you to decry the next witch hunt initiated by a professional SJW with many followers. Waiting. Patiently.

Comment Re:Whoosh (Score 1) 438

Problem is the "private property" of a college campus doesn't belong to a small subset of entitled students who've decided their feelings are more important than someone else's right to speak. The default setting is that people are allowed to speak freely, and any listener is free to refute them after hearing them out. This doesn't strengthen any case for safe spaces, it's just another bullshit argument on your part driven by social justice ideology.

Comment Re:Not sure what to think.... (Score 1) 798

Since you're getting praise above for prolific commenting, I'd like to state the opposite - it's annoying and pathetic to see people who can't restrain themselves to simply stating their opinions succinctly and moving on with their day. Nope, it's ABSOLUTELY IMPERATIVE that everyone in the thread with a 'wrong' opinion be corrected in every single instance, otherwise the racist alt-right bigots might ... GASP ... think they're winning. You spam around calling people out for a lack of decorum while showing none yourself. Slashdot ought to set a post limit to regulate this kind of behavior, which is reminiscent of a 12 year old throwing a temper tantrum on twitter.

Comment Re:The new owners of Slashdot really annoy me (Score 1) 715

Seems likely they're also guilty of manipulating moderation when someone posts something critical of their management they don't want to hear. Take the comment thread linked below for example. When I first saw the parent post a few days ago, it was moderated at +3 or +4 insightful. Now it's at -1 flamebait while the boilerplate responses by whipslash are apparently worthy of +5.

https://slashdot.org/comments....

Comment Re:Yes (Score 1) 335

I've actually more or less given up on public forums except for hackernews and a bit of reddit surfing (but not discussing). This is just another throwaway Google account after I deleted several /. accounts, all with excellent karma; I'm coming here less and less often, because the discussions have become too vitriolic - and I'm saying that as a Usenet veteran.

Hackernews is an extreme left Silicon Valley wankfest where, much like Ars Technica, they're very intolerant of any opinions viewed to be insufficiently progressive. You often hear the regulars chirping about how insightful the discussion is compared to so many other "toxic" websites, but this simply isn't supported by any objective appraisal of the commentary. Spending years living in an echo chamber distorts one's view of reality.

Take your concern trolling elsewhere.

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