Fed2 Star - July 8, 2018 - page 2 (of 2)

[Fiona Craig]

Fed2 Star
Earthdate July 8, 2018


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Official News part two


DUMB SALESMAN OF THE WEEK: NOT A ROBOT

by Hazed

In a really strange example of somebody using technology they have no
clue about, a salesman in a car dealership recently asked a customer to
make a tick on a piece of paper to prove they were not a robot.

Huh? Is robot technology so advanced these days that you can’t tell the
difference between a human and a droid?

The customer, Marci Robin, was going through all the paperwork that
needs to be signed when buying a new car, when she came across a
print-out of the online “I’m not a robot” box and was told to use a pen
to check the box.

“The sales guy was handing me paper after paper with a brief explanation
of what each one was for, and then he handed me that page — with
literally nothing else on it — and just matter-of-factly said, ‘And this
one is just to ensure you’re not a robot,’” Robin explained.

The reCAPCHA security measure works online because the way a human moves
the mouse before clicking on the checkbox is different from how a
program, or bot, would activate the tick. But how that relates to real
life situations is a mystery.

The explanation from the dealership makes no sense at all. A spokesman
said that it was common practice: “It’s not about us. In order for us to
print the next one, you have to check that. So we print it out, and have
the customer check that when we do.” Well yes, maybe you have to prove
you’re not a robot to print out all the paperwork, but surely you can
then just discard that page of the print out.

Besides, my guess is that if a robot is sophisticated enough to pass as
human, it will be able to use a pen and tick a box!

Source:
http://www.tampabay.com/news/transportation/She-was-looking-at-paperwork-to-buy-a-car-Then-she-had-to-confirm-that-she-was-not-a-robot-_168508214


PICTURES OF THE WEEK: SPITE BUILDINGS

by Hazed

I had never heard of spite houses until I came across this article about
them. They are buildings that are constructed specifically to irritate
another person or protest about something they have done.

This gallery of pictures includes houses built to get revenge on spurned
lovers, to annoy relatives or to take vengeance over perceived slights.

Take a look at the gallery of malicious constructions here:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jun/21/spite-buildings-when-human-grudges-get-architectural-in-pictures


WINDING DOWN

An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week’s net, technology and
science news
by Alan Lenton


Leafing through my diary (yes, I do have a paper diary) I see it’s been
six weeks since the last Winding Down. Six weeks since I was first laid
low by the dreaded shingles, which still hasn’t completely cleared up.
Fortunately it’s cleared up enough to at least let me get some decent
sleep at night, which means my ability to concentrate is improving.

I’m still not up to inscribing the usual snappy, incisive and witty
repartee that you, my readers, are used to receiving from me. But I’m
getting there. Looking through the backlog for the last month and a
half, I noticed that there were more than the usual sets of pictures, so
I thought that I would gather them all together in this edition, since
I’m not up to writing real analysis.

I hope you like at least some of my choices. Hopefully, there is
something for everyone in this selection.

Here we go!

New Atlas has some really nice pictures of what it considers to be
beautiful airplanes from the history of aviation. Though I wouldn’t
necessarily agree with their definition of beautiful, it does have some
good stuff in the gallery. Oh, and the picture of the Grumman F7F
Tigercat is really cool.
https://newatlas.com/most-beautiful-airplanes/54548/#gallery

Here’s something for Star Wars fans. A couple of friends are building an
accurate full scale Millennium Falcon Cockpit – in the garage... The
article includes a video of the guys talking about the project, as well
as some still shots.
https://www.sciencealert.com/replica-millenium-falcon-cockpit-screen-accurate-star-wars-fans

The UK’s National Health Service (NHS) recently passed its 70th
birthday, and so the Nursing Times opened a newly discovered photo
archive to show some pictures of what nursing was like around the time
of the Second World War, before the NHS came in to existence. I think I
would have freaked out becoming conscious and finding myself being
‘decontaminated’ by the figures shown in one of the pictures.
https://www.nursingtimes.net/news/education/rediscovered-photo-archive-gives-insight-into-nursing-before-nhs/7024250.article

And now more stuff from New Atlas. A gallery of really stunning
photographs, as seen from the cockpit of a 747. Features shown include
storms, St Elmo’s Fire (and just who was St Elmo, anyway?), lightning,
cloud formations, the Northern Lights, rivers, and the Sahara. Impressive!
https://newatlas.com/gallery-photography-from-cockpit-747-storms/54704/#gallery

Next, a rather different picture – and panoramic view of London in 1866.
Well sort of. It is, in fact, a Japanese block print by Utagawa
Yoshitora, who’d never actually been to London. So, here you are – the
Japanese version of London in 1866. PS: can you find the second of the
two copies of St Pauls cathedral?
https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2018/05/22/japanese-prints-of-london-in-1866-are-very-japanese/

It seems that the USA’s National Security Agency (NSA) has recently
released a bunch of posters that is used in the 1950s and 60s to remind
it’s employees about the need for security. Some of them look very dated
now, but they are an interesting take on an important period of the cold
war. The article includes a sample of the posters and a link to the
complete set (which is a pdf file). Thanks to reader Michael for drawing
my attention to the posters.
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/43548d/nsa-historical-propaganda-posters-foia

Of course, no set of visual subjects would be complete with out some
astronomy pictures, so it’s back to New Atlas to fix that omission. This
is a set of pictures of Nebulae, which are the remains of exploding
stars, especially the expanding debris from the explosion. I’ve got
several of them available as wallpaper for my computer. My favourites?
The Crab Nebula (an old favourite), the Helix Nebula (very creepy), The
Horsehead Nebula (another old favourite), and the remarkable Pillars of
Creation.
https://newatlas.com/nebula-gallery-photos/55022/#gallery

Any finally, back down to Earth with a picture of the full moon over
Manhattan’s East 96th Street. Nice work, and difficult to get just
right. Enjoy.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap180630.html


And as a bonus, a quote for the week from the Brit politician Herbert
Asquith:

“The War Office keeps three sets of figures: one to mislead the public,
another to mislead the cabinet, and the third to mislead itself.”

Source Oxford Dictionary of Quotations


Acknowledgements

Thanks to readers Barb, Fi and Michael for drawing my attention to
material for Winding Down.

Please send suggestions for stories to al...@ibgames.com and include the
words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless
prose gobbled up by my voracious Thunderbird spam filter...

Alan Lenton
al...@ibgames.com
8 July 2018

Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist,
the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web
site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan.

Past issues of Winding Down can be found at
http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.