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Accident in Croydon
On Sep 10, 11:18*am, (Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:
In article , (Pyromancer) wrote: Upon the miasma of midnight, a darkling spirit identified as Tom Anderson gently breathed: http://www.flickr.com/photos/twic/2844493252/ You should send that to the Warrington Cycle Campaign for their "Facility Of The Month" page - top work! I use the segregated cycle lane sections to the west of that location between the Bedford Way/Tavistock Sq junction and Marchmont St on my way from Westminster to King's Cross station. I don't use the section between Marchmont St and Judd St illustrated and have never seen this nonsense. I can't for the life of me think why that crossover isn't arranged at the lights on the Judd St junction Well it is, as a result of the previous one, in that anyone continuing east along Tavistock Place has to make the reverse move after a few yards, across the path of cyclists heading west. The whole assumption seems to be that all cyclists heading east will turn south down Hunter Street, but I can't see why they should. As for why the path has to stay on the north, I'm guessing that it must be something to do with how one can get on to it at the Tottenham Court Road end, where it is against the one-way flow of Torrington Place. I can't remember how one gets to it from Tottenham Court Road, unless there's a contraflow bike lane there. but then they wouldn't have the anti-cyclist lights arrangement at the Marchmont St junction if they were that sensible. |
Accident in Croydon
On Sep 11, 8:52 pm, Tom Anderson wrote:
brain, but it can do some quite amazing and unexpected things. Have you come across this gait analysis business, for instance? Basically, software can extract enough unique information about the way someone walks to uniquely identify them in a crowd. Big-brother-tastic! Thats what the companies who sell the software keep saying. Personally I have my doubts about how reliable it would be. If software still isn't up to the task of doing decent object or handwriting or speech recognition then what are the odds it can *reliably* spot a specific person in a crowd by the way they walk? I'll believe it when I see it. B2003 |
Accident in Croydon
On 12 Sep, 09:59, Boltar wrote:
On Sep 11, 8:52 pm, Tom Anderson wrote: brain, but it can do some quite amazing and unexpected things. Have you come across this gait analysis business, for instance? Basically, software can extract enough unique information about the way someone walks to uniquely identify them in a crowd. Big-brother-tastic! Thats what the companies who sell the software keep saying. Personally I have my doubts about how reliable it would be. If software still isn't up to the task of doing decent object or handwriting or speech recognition then what are the odds it can *reliably* spot a specific person in a crowd by the way they walk? I'll believe it when I see it. B2003 It's yet another attempt at trying to get computers to do things that people do well. Computers are best used for things that people don't do well. Computers can do thousands of totally accurate calcluations in a second, which people can't, so that's what they should be used for. It doesn't mean that computers are cleverer than people for all tasks. People, on the other hand, can recognise each other and understand speech. Trying to get a computer to do this is like trying to get a car to walk upstairs, just because it's better than a person at doing 70 mph and therefore supposedly faster in all contexts. |
Accident in Croydon
On Sep 12, 10:38 am, MIG wrote:
It's yet another attempt at trying to get computers to do things that people do well. Computers are best used for things that people don't do well. I think its just paranoid politicians clutching at any techno straw thats dangled in front of them. If they seriously think people can't change their way of walking to avoid being spotted perhaps they should go and find out about this novel thing known as "acting". Actors do it all the time in different roles. Theres no reason to believe Mr Terrorist (or more likely Mr Expired Parking Ticket Man) can't do it as well. People, on the other hand, can recognise each other and understand speech. Trying to get a computer to do this is like trying to get a car to walk upstairs, just because it's better than a person at doing 70 mph and therefore supposedly faster in all contexts. Computers will get there in the end , though I'm not convinced this Brave New World will be as wonderful as all the techno evengelists want us to believe. Machines might have done a lot of physical donkey work for us for 2 centuries but then horses did it before that , and its not our physicality that makes us human - its our brains and minds. If you replace human thinking with machine thinking you're taking away everything. B2003 |
Accident in Croydon
On Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 09:14:13PM +0100, Tom Anderson wrote:
Could you make a bus derivative of a Land Rover? Mine would seat 13 passengers + driver. So in TfL service that would be 39 passengers, 20 of whom wouldn't have valid tickets. -- David Cantrell | Hero of the Information Age Compromise: n: lowering my standards so you can meet them |
Accident in Croydon
On Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 08:52:33PM +0100, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Thu, 11 Sep 2008, David Cantrell wrote: The latter would mean making cyclists identifiable, with number plates. Good idea. Only if you wanted to do it with cameras. If there were actual people, they could stop them there and then. Good luck catching a cycle courier when you're on foot! Have you come across this gait analysis business, for instance? Basically, software can extract enough unique information about the way someone walks to uniquely identify them in a crowd. Big-brother-tastic! Detecting dangerous lane changes would seem trivial by comparison. A lane change is only dangerous by nature of the other traffic around it. To spot a dangerous lane change you need to "understand" the whole picture. And if you're going to have a person, why not just have them stand next to the junction in question? Well, because one person can monitor more than one camera. Not very well. And even if they can, once they've spotted a cyclist (or a pedestrian, or a horse rider, or a driver) being naughty they thenr have to dispatch someone to go and nick 'em, by which time it's too late. -- David Cantrell | London Perl Mongers Deputy Chief Heretic "Cynical" is a word used by the naive to describe the experienced. George Hills, in uknot |
Accident in Croydon
On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, David Cantrell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 08:52:33PM +0100, Tom Anderson wrote: On Thu, 11 Sep 2008, David Cantrell wrote: The latter would mean making cyclists identifiable, with number plates. Good idea. Only if you wanted to do it with cameras. If there were actual people, they could stop them there and then. Good luck catching a cycle courier when you're on foot! Taser! Have you come across this gait analysis business, for instance? Basically, software can extract enough unique information about the way someone walks to uniquely identify them in a crowd. Big-brother-tastic! Detecting dangerous lane changes would seem trivial by comparison. A lane change is only dangerous by nature of the other traffic around it. To spot a dangerous lane change you need to "understand" the whole picture. Yes. And i don't think that's beyond the abilities of a computer. It won't be as good as a human, but if it can be 80% as good for 1% of the cost, then that's a win. And if you're going to have a person, why not just have them stand next to the junction in question? Well, because one person can monitor more than one camera. Not very well. And even if they can, once they've spotted a cyclist (or a pedestrian, or a horse rider, or a driver) being naughty they thenr have to dispatch someone to go and nick 'em, by which time it's too late. if it's a driver, they just note the plate and send them a fine. Non-plated road users can't be caught in this way, but then they account for a tiny fraction of dangerous road use. tom -- Subvert the paradigm! |
Accident in Croydon
On Thu, 11 Sep 2008, MIG wrote:
On Sep 10, 11:18*am, (Colin Rosenstiel) wrote: In article , (Pyromancer) wrote: Upon the miasma of midnight, a darkling spirit identified as Tom Anderson gently breathed: http://www.flickr.com/photos/twic/2844493252/ You should send that to the Warrington Cycle Campaign for their "Facility Of The Month" page - top work! I use the segregated cycle lane sections to the west of that location between the Bedford Way/Tavistock Sq junction and Marchmont St on my way from Westminster to King's Cross station. I don't use the section between Marchmont St and Judd St illustrated and have never seen this nonsense. I can't for the life of me think why that crossover isn't arranged at the lights on the Judd St junction Well it is, as a result of the previous one, in that anyone continuing east along Tavistock Place has to make the reverse move after a few yards, across the path of cyclists heading west. The whole assumption seems to be that all cyclists heading east will turn south down Hunter Street, but I can't see why they should. No. And since the route continues to the east, via the recently and expensively rearranged Ampton Street, that can't actually be one of their assumptions. Which makes the current layout completely inexplicable. As for why the path has to stay on the north, I'm guessing that it must be something to do with how one can get on to it at the Tottenham Court Road end, where it is against the one-way flow of Torrington Place. I can't remember how one gets to it from Tottenham Court Road, unless there's a contraflow bike lane there. There isn't. You cross over TCR, then come down Huntley Street to Torrington Place. I think. If you're coming from the western end of the SSL, on New Cavendish Street, that is. tom -- Subvert the paradigm! |
Accident in Croydon
On 2008-09-12, Tom Anderson wrote:
This message is in MIME format. The first part should be readable text, while the remaining parts are likely unreadable without MIME-aware tools. ---910079544-1465376680-1221240855=:22240 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8BIT Should you not know better than to send it to Usenet like that? MIME _and_ 8bit - well, really! |
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