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Comment by timanglade | Hacker News Reader

Just wanted to say thanks for the warm welcome from HN when the app was released last month — I hope this blogpost answers the questions that were raised back then.

I’d be happy to answer anything else you’d like to know!

Original thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14347211

Demo of the app (in the show): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACmydtFDTGs

App for iOS: https://itunes.apple.com/app/not-hotdog/id1212457521

App for Android (just released yesterday): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.seefoodtec...

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I am making an app that takes pictures and tries to tell you if the food in the picture has allergens. I didn't know if I should feel humble or just laugh. (I decided it was hilarious in the end) But it made me aim higher in a hackathon last weekend. I also use your app in my elevator pitch for people to understand.

Great idea that I would be terrified to pursue from a legal perspective.

I am going to chime in and really suggest they hire a qualified legal professional - if they intend to share this application. A simple disclaimer may not be adequate.

Edit: Typo.

Yea I'm not going to release the app. I was already on the fence on it. I could have finished it months ago but I was worried about legal implications . Thank you .

No problem. I wouldn't even give it away, with any disclaimer, without consulting a qualified legal professional. That sort of thing is just begging for a lawsuit.

I am kind of curious how well you do. If you ever do get it going, there may be a use for it - but, again, liability is a huge factor in something like this.

I am not a lawyer but I have spent a whole lot of time with lawyers and in court rooms. It was part of my business, indirectly. Thankfully, I sold and retired years ago.

I could send you a dev build if you really want .

Oh, no thank you. I'll just watch from afar. Also, I have a Windows phone. Yup. I know my shame. It's the only Microsoft OS I have. I figure nobody is writing malware for it. ;-)

Yes. I'm not going to release the app. The show already discouraged me and made me do another app that won't have legal implications .

While it seems great to be able to take a picture, that’s going to be very hard to know what’s in a sauce, stuffed inside of something, complex presentation, etc.

Why not be able to search over a list, and once on an item, show frequently related (e.g. garlic if you search onion). It may not involve any “AI,” but it’ll be far more accurate and easier to implement.

Is this possible? It doesn't seem like the necessary information is captured in a picture.

I don't think there's a person that could tell you whether food in a picture has allergens, let alone an app.

Yes you are right. The app works by identifying the dish and then searching in an ingredient database. If the dish looks visually the same to one with peanuts then the app would have a false negative .

Why is this not available outside the US and Canada?

So the long version of this story is that the app was released in partnership with the HBO Go / HBO Now team, and using the terms of service they used for these apps (which are only available in the US & Canada). We’ve been working with lawyers to release the app worldwide without running afoul of any local laws, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed that will get cleared this week, we just gotta make sure our terms of service are up to par… After all, we wouldn’t want to fall prey to something we made fun of this very season ;) http://www.vulture.com/2017/04/silicon-valley-recap-season-4...

Do you have a special algorithm to determine Canada/US and not Canada/US.

:D now, that would be an app worth investing in

Big interest from the Trump administration! (Huge interest, so big, the biggest.)

Their neural network localizes your submitted hotdog images. To get around the block, try showing it a Canadian hotdog.

Will it block Canadian hotdogs shot on USA soil? How about Mexican hotdogs? Asking for a friend.

Canadian hotdogs on US soil (aka "cross-dogging") and vice versus are disambiguated by shadow inclination vs timestamp to estimate latitude (outdoors) and fingerprinting microfluctuations in the power grid and resulting effects on lighting (indoors, Canada has a much larger share of hydroelectric).

GPS was considered, but rejected as insufficiently cool.

Hmmm, BRB, writing pylsur or not pylsur.

Because HBO I guess. There are a lot of contents are filtered outside of USA.

Can you speak to the origins of it being 'not hotdog'?

Did you, or the writing staff or other consultants, start with hotdogs or dick picks?

It made me laugh because it reminded me of this popular lecture(o) that was, and is, passed around tech circles

Any relation? Or fun coincidence?

(o) https://youtu.be/uJnd7GBgxuA?t=5555s .. the lecture is given by andrej karpathy on 2016-09-24 and the timestamp goes to a point in the lecture where the lecturer discusses an interface made to have humans compete with conv nets to identify hotdogs

Ha seems like a fun coincidence. The writers came up with it early in the writing of season 4, and I started working on it sometime in the Summer of 2016 iirc. As far as the origin story goes, it was just great writers coming up with a great joke! Our lead technical consultant Todd mentioned to them we could actually build their joke for real, and the show jumped on the idea!

Classic.. yeah I think the lecturer says the project was from 2014

I suppose it's a clear testament to the quality of the show and its commentary.. thanks for your contribution to that end!

Slightly offtopic, but I wonder how hard it was to attach eGPU to MacBook Pro? Is there some official support, or was it just a dirty hack?

Not offtopic at all! Dirty hack for sure. The enclosure I bought was a hack, the drivers were a hack, and there was software on top that was a hack as well. But the developer experience was totally awesome… Almost made the constant graphics crashes worth it. Almost.

Can you provide some more details on your eGPU hack for those of us who might want to try our hands on that as well?

There is official support for eGPUs in macOS High Sierra beta.

https://developer.apple.com/metal/

Thanks for sharing your process. I was inspired by the show to build my own app. It's pretty crazy how quickly you can build something like this now.

The Android App is not available in Germany. :(

In which countries is it available? Mine isn't :(

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