Jul 17, 2008
We’ll now be able to maintain better visual and personalized presence around Think Artificial. After some CSS struggling due to discrepancies between Firefox and Safari page rendering, I’ve finished implementing Gravatars on the site! (I’m sorry IE6 users, I don’t have time to test and accommodate a broken browser — please get Firefox).
If your comment shows up with a gray person like the third comment above, it means you’ll have to get yourself a Gravatar. If you haven’t heard of Gravatars, or Globally Recognized Avatars, they’re a service that allows you to upload and associate an avatar with your e-mail address. Since they’re in use by many popular websites, it’ll spare you some time when commenting or creating accounts there—all you’ll have to do is enter your email address and they’ll pop up automatically (email encrypted via the MD5 algorithm). For the record, the people on the pic with me above are Gnorb and Esther — both of which run great blogs.
See you around.
Jul 13, 2008
A subscriber of Think Artificial wrote to ask me about games and AI. In short, DF asked what my thougths are on AI in games and which ones I think are the most intelligent.
To answer this bluntly: Game AI is very different from it’s non-game counterpart, and it’s not my field of study. I’ve only compared modern games through a window. However, Alex of AIGameDev has superb coverage of AI in games and the top AI games of 2007, by community vote. The top of the line are Half-Life-2.ep.2 and BioShock.
But regarding Game AI in general: modern games are horribly void of intelligence. It depends on where you set the bar, certainly. There’s tons of AI in modern games compared to 5 years ago. But the first thing to note is that Game AI is not the same as AI. It’s a subset of it. Just like discrete mathematics are a subset of mathematics. And moreover, Game AI is a very specialized subset—it has well defined goals, models for construction and limitations.
Jul 7, 2008
On May 27th 2007 I launched ThinkArtificial.org, a symbolic step up from my earlier blog that I’d been running for some months.
Following that step I was faced with whether I should flag the number of subscribers on the site. To set myself a goal I decided I wouldn’t reveal the number until it reached 300. And now it has happened.
Subscribers to TA have been holding at around 300 for about a month now—subscribers being people that are either subscribed to the site’s RSS feed or via email. Not counting those that visit the site regularly.
My thanks to everyone who’s been reading. You’re the reason I’m still at it.
Jul 3, 2008
Check out this really amazing animation artwork done through a web interface to the ContextFree.js library created by Aza Raskin, a port of the open source application by Chris Coyn. It provides means of creating beautiful generative art with minuscule amounts of code. Make sure you watch it to the end where the Sierpiński triangle is generated with 3 lines of code.
Jun 26, 2008
UPDATE-1: The issue has been resolved.
The site’s feed has been having some trouble since June 13th which may coincide with a software update I did around that time. The bug caused the site to stop generating an RSS feed.
It seem I’ve resolved the issue. If anyone has still not received updates since the post “Reaper UAV Used Against Enemy Targets” I’d appreciate that you report it.
Jun 26, 2008
THE HAPPENING
- Director/Writer: M. Night Shyamalan / M. Night Shyamalan
- Release Date: 11 June 2008
- Plot outline: A paranoid thriller about people on the run in a natural crisis that presents a large-scale threat to humanity.
- Freebase entry.
[UPDATE] See the conclusion in the comments below.
And now for a look at science fiction: I watched Shyamalan’s The Happening last night and, you know, this may have just been the most interesting movie this year. No really: simply because I can’t wrap my head around it. What the hell was that? Why the bad acting, why the goofy protagonist? Is there a puzzle in there somewhere? Read on for a brief rant.
Jun 21, 2008
I’ve been tagged by my blog buddy in-arms Tim Stevens to write seven random (and not so random) facts about myself. (Yes, blog memes are still alive and well.) So it’s about time to shake things up with something personal.
The rules are:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.
5. Present an image of martial discord from whatever period or situation you’d like.
You must excuse that I thought about what I should write due to a failure in my random-thought function. But the following are selected facts from a brainstorm.
The se7en random facts
- Six years ago I underwent brain surgery. I had a tumor the size of a large chicken egg pushing on my cerebellum. Keen eyes can spot the tumor on the online 3D model of my brain.
- Since I left kindergarten all friends I’ve made have been older than I am.
- I’m an agnostic atheist. My mother fears I’ll go to hell.
- I read Snow Crash in English when I was 10 years old. My teacher couldn’t believe I understood it and questioned me about its content. (Remember that I’m Icelandic)
- I take pride in that last fact and sometimes mention it in vain.
- I recently started doing Zen-flavored meditation.
- The lovely summer of 2006, a baby raven with a crooked leg landed in my lap. I fixed his leg with braces and raised him for a year. (that’s him in the header pic). He’s living in the wild now. I miss that crazy bird dearly.
And then to name the next seven minds (in no specific order):
Hat’s off to the tagged!
Jun 13, 2008
The UK controlled Skynet 5C satellite was launched from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana yesterday. It’s purpose is to allow various parts of the military to increase data transmission rates and pass two 2.5 times the current amount of data between command centers worldwide. One of the things utilizing these comlinks is the Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle, which reportedly has- and is being used in combat against enemy targets.
Jun 9, 2008
I don’t care that it’s Star Wars oriented - playing music with a floppy drive is awesome. Can we top that? Wouldn’t know how to measure it, but click through to hear the floppy drive, a singing scanner and a whole band played with a HDD.
Jun 4, 2008
Director & 3D animator Neill Blomkamp was attached to directing the adapatation of the videogame Halo in 2007, but the project unfortunately appears to be canned. I say unfortunately because a short film like the one below called Alive in Joburg convincingly implies that Blomkamp was well suited to the task.
