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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 15th, 2023

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  • It is an interesting article, even if it’s conclusions are entirely too rosy. The “storefront” was a single vending machine, and the bot was instructed to interact with Anthropic employees (with an hourly cost attached) to do all physical interactions. While the bot did a decent job managing the stock most of the time, it made a lot of bad decisions based on trying to be too helpful to it’s customers. It also frequently hallucinated, with some hilarious results I wont spoil here. But as anyone who owns a small business knows, one bad decision could put it under, so saying that an AI can manage a vending machine well “most of the time” is equivalent to saying it cant do the job at all.

    Their conclusion is that with a bit more work, Claude might be able to perform as a middle-manager. To me, that says more about how useless middle-management is than how capable their AI is.









  • I’ll save you all a click

    Disney is planning to introduce “virtual storefronts” to its popular streaming services, including Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN. These storefronts will allow viewers to order snacks or pick out products they’ve seen in their favorite shows, all while continuing to stream their movie or show. Disney+ subscribers will see interactive ads pop up as well.

    So, basically, stuffing more ads into the premium service you paid for (presumably to avoid ads). These people don’t get it, do they?


  • As a man, I’ve never been made to feel excluded by gender equality in any way whatsoever.

    Same here. However, I suspect you and I are not zero-sum thinkers, and can conceive of a future in which both men and women can apply themselves to their full potential.

    But it seems like a key part of the counter-movement to gender equality is based on the notion that every time a woman gets a job, they are taking it away from a more qualified man. It seems to be built on a mountain of insecurity more than anything else.


  • A bet isnt a bet until there are multiple opposing sides matched together. If there is no bookie managing it, then it’s up to the individual participants to do it. If someone says “5 bucks on the big strong guy” it’s not an actual bet until someone comes along and puts money down opposite it.

    When the supporting character comes along and says “100 bucks on the other guy whose win moves the plot along”, it’s like he’s saying " I will match all the announced bets on the big guy so far, and everyone else’s up to a total of $100".

    They could take the time to show that person taking out a wad of 5’s and physically matching the bets already thrown down, but it’s more expedient to just do the shouting and then cut to the end of it.



  • If your goal is to roll a 7, then no, weighting one die doesn’t help, because it doesn’t matter which side comes up in the weighted die.

    (Another way to look at it is that you can place 1 die on whatever side you like, then roll the 2nd die: you still have a 1/6 chance of rolling a combined 7).

    However that is only the case for a 7, because you can roll a 7 with any combination of the first die (and a particular value in the 2nd). If your goal is to roll a 12, then weighting one die towards 6 will affect the odds, because you need a 6 on that first die to roll a 12; any other outcome makes it impossible.