How to do new things

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The best way to learn something is to start doing it. Don’t wait for full knowledge to come to you. Often it won’t. Just pretend you know what you’re doing, and hit the walls. Make the problem small enough that you can start solving it right now, without waiting. Each part of the problem is smaller than the whole thing. And tell yourself you can do it, because you can.

Yep. Characteristic wisdom from Dave Winer, the guy who got me blogging all those years ago, and who continues to amaze and inspire people everywhere.

Big Data and the Hype Cycle

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This morning’s Observer column.

As the “big data” bandwagon gathers steam, it’s appropriate to ask where it currently sits on the hype cycle. The answer depends on which domain of application we’re talking about. If it’s the application of large-scale data analytics for commercial purposes, then many of the big corporations, especially the internet giants, are already into phase four. The same holds if the domain consists of the data-intensive sciences such as genomics, astrophysics and particle physics: the torrents of data being generated in these fields lie far beyond the processing capabilities of mere humans.

But the big data evangelists have wider horizons than science and business: they see the technology as a tool for increasing our understanding of society and human behaviour and for improving public policy-making. After all, if your shtick is “evidence-based policy-making”, then the more evidence you have, the better. And since big data can provide tons of evidence, what’s not to like?

So where on the hype cycle do societal applications of big data technology currently sit? The answer is phase one, the rapid ascent to the peak of inflated expectations, that period when people believe every positive rumour they hear and are deaf to sceptics and critics…

Read on

Facebook’s “freakishly accurate” face recognition technology

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Facial recognition software is almost as good at identifying people as humans are, thanks to Facebook. The Facebook AI team published a paper last week highlighting their achievements with DeepFace, the company’s unsettlingly precise facial recognition program.

DeepFace can identify faces at a 97.25 percent accuracy level, just slightly worse than the average human score of 97.53 percent, as Technology Review noted. The DeepFace system reduced facial recognition software errors by 25 percent compared to earlier versions of the software, which is a vast improvement.

‘Freakishly’ is one way of putting it.

Source

Partition blues

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From J.K. Appleseed, writing in McSweeney’s:

How awesome would it be if you could partition your brain in the manner of a computer’s hard drive?

You could devote 7% of your brain to operate in foreign languages, 5% to cooking Italian food, 5% to knowing kung fu, and let’s say 23% to seduction techniques, just for starters. The sky’s the limit! Especially after you devote 5% of your brain to learning how to pilot a helicopter.

A modular brain would be so much easier to manage. You could selectively delete all unnecessary pop lyrics, reality TV show trivia, and the films of Zack Snyder. I would, however, suggest retaining the meta-memory of hating his movies, even though you no longer remember what they were, so as not to repeat your mistake. With the cleared up space, you could now set aside 5% for learning to play blues piano!

We’re only up to 50% at this point. The world of your brain is your oyster!

Right.

Meanwhile, your actual noggin is an undisciplined soup of useless details. You don’t remember where your car keys are, but you can’t get that stupid lick of Katy Perry’s “Roar” out of your head. You know the one. It goes, “Whoa, whoa! Oh, oh, oh, ohhh!”

Quote of the Day

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“Many of history’s great inventions are really great appropriations — middling ideas if used as intended, brilliant when reoriented or co-opted.”

Kathryn Schultz, The New Yorker, April 7, 2014.

What Zuckerberg is really up to

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Very perceptive post by Felix Salmon. The gist:

Is it too early to declare that Zuckerberg has ambitions to become the Warren Buffett of technology? Look at his big purchases — Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus. None of them are likely to be integrated into the core Facebook product any time soon; none of them really make it better in any visible way. I’m sure he promised something similar to Snapchat, too.

Zuckerberg knows how short-lived products can be, on the internet: he knows that if he wants to build a company which will last decades, it’s going to have to outlast Facebook as we currently conceive it. The trick is to use Facebook’s current awesome profitability and size to acquire a portfolio of companies; as one becomes passé, the next will take over. Probably none of them will ever be as big and dominant as Facebook is today, but that’s OK: together, they can be huge.

Zuckerberg is also striking while the iron is hot. Have you noticed how your Facebook news feed is filling up with a lot of ads these days? Zuckerberg is, finally, monetizing, and he’s doing it at scale: Facebook’s net income grew from $64 million in the fourth quarter of 2012 to $523 million in the fourth quarter of 2013. At the same time, his stock — which he is aggressively using to make acquisitions — is trading at a p/e of 100. If you’re going shopping with billions of dollars in earnings multiplied by a hundred, you can buy just about anything you like.

Eventually, inevitably, Facebook (the product) will lose its current dominance. But by that point, Facebook (the company) will have so many fingers in so many pies that it might not matter.

Hmmm… We’ll see.