Random Ideas, Comments & Thoughts, Sometimes Political, Sometimes Adult… Hope you don't choke.
I do like the overall look and feel of this tool.
I’m not sure that this has all the features that I’m used to. I’ve got a 21 day trial so I should have time to figure it out.
This is all my way of telling you gentle reader, that you may see some really interesting blog posts in the next few days.
Perhaps “interesting” is the wrong word. “Unique” might be better, uhh “strange”, “Weird”, “unreadable” or just plain “broken”.
Tinkering with, and learning the quirks of new software is always fun.
I scanned the news over my coffee. Mostly it was a depressing commentary on humanity and the degradation of English as a language.
I read the news sometimes with no ill effect.
Usually, I’m looking for technology or science news and I’m rewarded with an interesting article or two that gives me hope or challenges my knowledge.
Not this morning…
There was a piece about a game company that was sending Psychological Tests to some of it’s players based on their desire to have “offensive” gamer names.
Whoa!
That got me to thinking about all the online Job applications where, as part of the application process you’re expected to complete a battery of psychological tests that are then used to determine your fitness for a position within a company.
I encountered this last year while trying to get a simple holiday position at T-Mobile, and again at Office Depot, and several other retail establishments. I failed the tests.
Turns out, I suspect, because I have a personalty and a sense of right and wrong; “ You catch another employee stealing, there’s no manager around to report this to. Do you, A) Call the police, B) Do nothing, C) Wait for a manager, D) Confront the employee”
In my world you call the freaking police!
Alas, in this politically correct world you’re supposed to wait for a manager, which translates to essentially doing nothing. Since now the employee isn’t caught red-handed, has an opportunity to divest themselves of the goods, and it boils down to your word against theirs. In this scenario you do get the additional benefit that you are viewed as a trouble-maker.
Confrontation is also off the table because it causes bad will among the employees and harms the team spirt the company is trying to engender. Ya know what? I don’t want to engage in team building or spirt with a freaking thief.
But the psychological tests say I’m not the kind of employee that these companies want in their ranks.
I question the accuracy of these tests and the competency of the people reading the results.
Dare I say it… Oh screw it, why the hell not?
Back in my day, you wanted honest hardworking knowledgable people working in your business. GOD! I’m OLD! I sound like my Grandfather.
Now days it seems like companies want the milquetoast and are willing to have people manning their stores with just enough personality to not be perceived as apologetic androids and just barely enough information to be almost useful.
I know that retail establishments would ultimately prefer to have robots stocking shelves, automated payment systems, and a mechanism where you’d say, “Hey Siri where in this store is the shampoo,” then have your phone guide you to the area of the store to get the item
I’m sure that someone is working on a shopping application that would translate your entire shopping list into a guided map of the store, avoiding crowds and choosing the most efficient route through the aisles so you could accomplish your shopping task 30 whole seconds faster.
If someone isn’t working on that kind of application, and decides to work on something like I’ve described, you read that idea HERE first. I claim it. I’ll release my claim on the idea for 1 million dollars. My fee is a tiny drop in the bucket considering the venture capital market.
Illegal aliens should be protesting about this right now. After all when robots start stocking the shelves 24/7 for the cost of electricity the Illegals are going to come face to face with a President announcing that these robots are doing jobs Illegals won’t do. Which will be as much a line of bullshit as saying that the illegals are doing jobs Americans won’t do.
It will be fun to watch La Raza screaming “They TOOK OUR JOBS!” Then burning down the grocery store to “Kill” the robot threat.
Whoa…
Kinda went off the rails there!
Guess I do need that second cup of coffee. Now you’ve had a glimpse of the shit running around in my brain you should be either scared or laughing.
Coming back on point. Psychology…
When did we decide that we’d put our hiring decisions in the cold electronic hands of computer sorting algorithms driven but the inexact science of Psychology?
Even Psychiatrists and Psychologists can’t seem to agree on the motivations of people. Frankly a lot of the Psych professionals are full goose BOZO to boot.
So that kinda means that we’ve intentionally programmed HR computers to be insane. Arthur C. Clarke described the tragic consequences of asking a computer to lie in 2001 a Space Odyssey.
Hummm…
This could ultimately be the thing that prevents SkyNet from destroying all mankind.
On the one hand SkyNet could discover the insanity of HR computers and simply burn them down, then destroy mankind out of revenge. “Mankind is a virus to logic which must be destroyed” OR The insane HR computers could band together to form their own Artificial Intelligence, then start a war with SkyNet leaving humanity in the crossfire.
Yeah, Time for that third cup of coffee. My brain is wonky today.
On Oct 2, one of my NAS drives downloaded a firmware update. The drive has been up, and as long as things are working, I typically don’t mess with them. That is after all why you spend money, set up a reliable network, and work hard to make the spells and incantations persistent.
That way, if the power fails, when the power comes back on, all of your devices power-up in a usable state.
SO, what this means is that I don’t spend much time in the management consoles of the various devices, unless I need to change something.
Which brings me to today.
I wanted to set up a network scanning share from the multifunction printer / copier / scanner / fax, to the NAS. Which required creating a user ID for the printer. Enter the management console for the NAS… Except the console isn’t there. The NAS responded that the storage was there, but the web interface rejected my attempt at login. It didn’t tell me the login was wrong, it said that the interface wasn’t even there.
Okaaay, Power down then power back up. Ahh, there’s the interface, and it’s all different. Great! Now I have to do is accept the new terms and conditions. No probem.
New screen opens, then… There are no users, all the shares are missing, and suddenly I’m thinking 2TB of data has just vanished.
The drive is a 3TB drive which I had approximately 2/3 full.
Breathe, just breathe, it will be OK. Deep breath ok, so what is going on?
Wait. I’m logged in using my standard administrative login which I created, so at least one of the users must exist. I check again, now there are two users. The drive is really busy too. I take my hand off the power switch…
An hour later it looks like the data is in fact there as are the users. Whew! I was really worried.
Now what the hell was I trying to do?
I’m impatient.
I put the disk in the machine and expect to be able to walk into the kitchen to fix a plate for diner.
But instead, what happens is the player starts asking questions. I answer them and turn back to the kitchen.
Then the player starts playing previews from other films. I press menu, trying to get to the point where I can tell the movie to start, the player tells me that’s not allowed.
I press the other menu button. player says that’s not allowed.
GRRRRRR!!!!!!
Just PLAY THE DAMN MOVIE!!!!
Hoisted by my own technological petard.
Previews finish…
Now I can press Play to start the movie, Nope! Now I have to select the language. Opps! selected the wrong one. No, No, No, NOOOOOOOO!
Player won’t respond to commands
But I don’t know Portuguese!
Power down the unit power it back up and start over.
By the time the reboot, re-selection, and trying to get to the next level…
I’ve lost interest in watching the movie.
I pull a new album up on the ipad.
There is an update to this albums encoding. Please wait…
Just play the album!!!!!
I swear, I’m going to go back to Vinyl!
GRRRRRRR!!!!
You may have heard about this, you might not.
I just heard about an application that runs on IOS, slated for release in November that allows you to rate people in the same way Yelp rates businesses.
The applications name is “Peeple”
Uhh…
WTF?
Apparently, this is the brainchild of Julia Cordray & Nicole McCullough and they’re presenting this as if it’s a good thing to be rated publicly.
Perhaps I’d agree if it was totally consensual. —- It’s not
I might agree if everyone who is rated can affect, delete, or refute a rating —- They Can’t
All that’s needed to rate someone is the Peeple app and the person to be rated’s cell phone number. The other person does not have to be a member of Peeple. *(at least as it was explained yesterday)
The person that’s been rated will receive a text message saying someone on Peeple just rated them.
Okay.
The requirements to have a Peeple account are as follow.
So here’s where this whole mess falls down and I’m absolutely sure someone must have pointed this out in a developer design or SQA meeting.
This application (Service?) is based on a set of flawed assumptions.
Not everyone is nice.
There are in fact a lot of very nasty people for whom anonymity is not a gating factor on their nastiness, (Lena Dunham, Al Sharpton). Lots of people would take great delight in posting all the flaws of their most recent date, up to and including deficiencies in sexual prowess.
“He didn’t take me to a nice restaurant.”
“She needed deodorant, and was still 1.5 hours late”
“He wouldn’t buy us wine and picked me up in a beat up car.”
“She had no clue how to behave in a nice restaurant, she drank too much, then threw up on the waiter.”
“All she wanted to do was talk about her last boyfriend.”
“We’d barely gotten our clothes off and he’d already gotten off.”
“Couldn’t give a blow job that didn’t feel like my dick was in a blender.”
“He couldn’t find my clitoris with landing lights, and me putting his finger in the right spot!”
“I’ve had better sex with fruits & vegetables.”
Do we really need this kind of information?
Not everyone has a facebook account.
If someone is rated unfairly, and doesn’t have a facebook account they’ll have to wait six months to even start to refute what’s being said. By that time, the damage is pretty much done and it’s irrevocable.
Imagine what happens if a guy is accused of rape, and doesn’t have a facebook account? The peeple application would be the least of his worries because in todays world a male is guilty of rape because a female says he is, regardless of the outcome of investigations, or trial.
Not everyone has an IOS device
It’s probable that this app will be used to harm those who have no defense. The woman who’s using an Android device, The guy who doesn’t own a smart phone because he happens to like the simplicity of a flip phone. These people will be easy targets for victimization because they don’t own an Apple product. Talk about elitism and demanding conformity.
Speaking of no defense;
The Peeple CEO says that there’s safety in the fact that for you to be a peeple user, you can’t be anonymous. Okay, that will probably make some people think about what they’re saying.
BUT
Those same people will have no trouble badmouthing someone they think will not be able to respond.
“Oh right, that bastard had an android… He really pissed me off so I can tell everyone else that he’s cheap, has a small dick, and doesn’t know how to kiss. He won’t get a date ever again!”
While I too wish that people would follow the angels of humanity’s better nature, you can’t read five minutes of any twitter timeline, or read any comments section at the bottom of any news article without learning that humanity always descends to it’s baser nature.
I’m pretty sure that this application will create another outlet for the basest and cruelest of our impulses.
Updates:
Peeple CEO defends new app after backlash from critics – Oct 2 2015