Author: Leon

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Politics

Pentagon protecting us from drones with directives

As we all know, once a bureaucrat writes a directive, the problem is solved. Thankfully, we have a directive in place to make sure it’s always a real human pressing a button to drop bombs from a drone. There will be no chance of incompetent humans making mistakes nor of a computer virus taking over the drones.

Pentagon: A Human Will Always Decide When a Robot Kills You | Danger Room | Wired.com

Worried about the day when the robots become self-aware and start deciding who lives and who dies? The Pentagon’s actually written a directive to make sure that can’t happen, whatever the next steps are in autonomous robots.

Also: Drone crashes mount at civilian airports overseas – The Washington Post

Categories
Business Politics

Government kills Intrade to save movie exec jobs

Stossel shares some entertaining outrage, but the WSJ coverage leads with a reference to Hollywood that’s closer to the mark. Intrade must have been terribly threatening to the practice of picking hit movies. Even a stinker makes some cash, but not if a market warns everyone beforehand.

Government Crushes Innovative Online Prediction Market

Today, Americans were told that they must close their Intrade.com accounts. That happened because the federal government agency known as the “Commodity Futures Trading Commission” (CFTC) today sued the prediction market, where people from all over the world bet about things like who will win elections.

Intrade decided all its U.S. customers must now close their accounts and withdraw their money from the site.

UPDATE 12/07: I wanted to note that  probably first read about the Hollywood angle on the Overcoming Bias post Zitzewitz The Wise. I just couldn’t find that link when I wrote this post.

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Business

Freakonomics On Consulting

The Freakonomics podcast is great–I listen to it in bed with my Logitech Squeezebox Radio before falling asleep.  The most recent episode has Stephen Dubner talking to Robin Hason, one of the authors of the Overcoming Bias blog.

It’s about consulting: I Consult, Therefore I Am. There’s some useful (if cynical) advice, such as fifty percent of the job is nodding your head at whatever’s being said, thirty percent of it is just sort of looking good, and the other twenty percent is raising an objection but then if you meet resistance, then dropping it.

Overcoming Bias : Freakonomics On Consulting

Me in January on Too Much Consulting?:

…

The CEO often understands what needs to be done, but does not have the resources to fight this blocking coalition. But if a prestigious outside consulting firm weighs in, that can turn the status tide.

Freakonomics Radio interviewed me about it a bit later, and they’ve just put up a podcast they say was “inspired in part” by my post. In addition to me, they talk to Keith Yost, a former consultant:

Fellow consultants and associates … [said] fifty percent of the job is nodding your head at whatever’s being said, thirty percent of it is just sort of looking good, and the other twenty percent is raising an objection but then if you meet resistance, then dropping it.

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Categories
Politics

FCC trolls Dish Network

It sure looks like the FCC played a dirty trick on Dish by giving approval to provide wireless service on the ground but stipulating conditions that make it impractical. I bet somebody got some nice stuff from a lobbyist.

Dish Network LTE plan: FCC chairman gives support | BGR

Good news for everyone who wants to see more competition in the United States wireless industry: Federal Communications Commission chairman Julius Genachowski is throwing his weight behind Dish Network’s (DISH) proposal to use a 40MHz chunk of satellite spectrum on the 2GHz band for terrestrial LTE-Advanced services.

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News

Minecraft on a Raspberry Pi

Mojang will release a version of Minecraft Pocket Edition for the Raspberry Pi, a tiny cheap computer sold by a charity that encourages young people to get interested in hacking computer hardware. My two sons are completely addicted to Minecraft and play on Windows and Ubuntu. Minecraft PE is not exactly as featureful as the ordinary version, so they probably wouldn’t care about getting a Pi and playing there.

I’ve noticed lots of innovation in tiny PCs coming out of China that run either Android or Ubuntu. In addition to tablets and laptops, there are the gamepad and HDMI stick form factors. For not much more than the Pi, you could get an HDMI stick like this: Mini MK802 Android 4.0 Google TV Box HD IPTV Player PC Allwinner A10 1G DDR3. I’m sure there’s some fun to be had putting the Pi into a box and hacking it, but it seems like one of these HDMI sticks would actually be more fun on the software side.

Minecraft is coming to Raspberry Pi!

Have you ever thought about learning to program? Where would you begin? How much would it cost? What would you need to get things moving?

The Raspberry Pi is a credit card-sized computer that’s a great starting point. It’s cheap, capable, and approachable for newbie programmers. It’s also extremely fun to play around with, no matter your experience with code. Plug it into a TV or monitor, attach a keyboard, and begin.

Soon you’ll be able to play and program with Minecraft on one of the snazzy little devices. Aron and Daniel have dedicated time to porting a version of Minecraft: Pocket Edition that comes with a revised feature set and support for multiple programming languages. We’re calling it Minecraft: Pi Edition, and it will be completely free to download.