Monday  2002-07-29   World

Who are the pirates now?

Several congressmen are introducing a bill that lets the entertainment industry take over people's computers to prevent "piracy".

Or maybe instead of breaking into people's computers, how about hiring deliverymen, utility meter readers, real-estate agents, and so on to enter people's houses and look for ill-gotten copyright material?

And if there is widespread "piracy", shouldn't Coast Guard and Navy respond? Can we have Marine detachments guard our houses and Internet connections?

As for the Congressmen sponsoring this bill, one wonders if they would be happier as highly paid full-time lobbyists for the industry? At the very least they wouldn't be sailing under a false flag of "people's representatives".

Monday  2002-07-29   World

TIPS for snitches

Operation TIPS or Terrorism Information and Prevention System is a US Federal program that encourages citizens (especially people like mail carriers, utility workers who visit lots of people and houses) to inform on suspicious activities of their fellow citizens. Amid a great deal of angry criticism of TIPS during last couple of weeks, Eugene Volokh at UCLA law school points out that there is nothing intrinsically wrong with government asking people to report crime like terrorism (it is after all people's right to report crimes) while conceding open possibilities for abuse and inefficiency. While Professor Volokh's argument is eminently reasonable, it does not soothe people's feelings. What makes people angry is that their public servants had galls to slip the leash and came up with such impudent idea of encouraging people to become snitches. It is bad enough America suffered its worst massacre partly because these public servants were either negligent or incompetent to prevent it. Yet not one of them was sanctioned for their dereliction of duty. And now this?

Monday  2002-07-29   Software

Contours' book recommendation

Contours' book recommendation is for serious students of computer science.

Monday  2002-07-29   Software

RISKS

RISKS digest - or how computers amplify human follies.

Monday  2002-07-29   Software

ALICE and SHRDLU

ALICE is a natural language artificial intelligence chat robot. Its creator Richard Wallace is also famous for his fallout with much of AI academia (see New York Times Magazine's profile on 2002-07-07). Slashdot is carrying a long interview with Dr Wallace.

SHRDLU was an earlier AI natural language program from 1968-1970 that is enjoying a revival. Its classic demo dialog is most instructive.