Google's "Bacon number" search | Hacker News Reader

Google's "Bacon number" search

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I'm disappointed it doesn't work with Erdös numbers.

I thought Google was supposed to be a geeky company.

Probably because there's no easily accessible data store like IMDB for famous mathematicians or computer scientists.

Actually there is an automated Erdos number search here:

http://www.ams.org/mathscinet/collaborationDistance.html

using the MathSciNet reference database. Unfortuately, it is only accessible to MathSciNet subscribers, so basically on all university campuses or libraries.

My Erdos number is no higher than 5 :-).

Hm. My old professor has an Erdős number of 3. I should see about authoring a paper with him…

Microsoft's Academic search uses Erdos as a gimmick:

http://academic.research.microsoft.com/VisualExplorer

(The gimmick is that Erdos is the default for the co-author path visualization)

http://genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/

http://www.freebase.com/view/en/mathematician/-/people/profe...

http://www.freebase.com/view/en/computer_scientist/-/people/...

The more important piece thats missing is the one that Journals need to contribute - papers and author lists. ;)

IMDB data has serious licensing restrictions. I would be extremely surprised if it were used as a source for this.

IMDB, which started in the days of Usenet, was founded on user contributions. In today's parlance, it's built from user generated content (UGC).

It would be surprising to see any suit to enforce the licensing restrictions on a database built from user contributions like IMDB actually go to trial.

We might come away with some interesting answers to the questions of what licensing terms on such databases are truly enforceable (as opposed to mere intimidation).

What happened to that Craigslist lawsuit? How is that progressing?

Strange times we live in, when making an algorithm to calculate a random piece of trivia is no longer considered 'geeky' =)

Well, yes, but it's not an interesting piece of trivia. Like the Erdös numbers.

> Well, yes, but it's not an interesting piece of trivia. Like the Erdös numbers.

Yes, true, but by not being actually interesting as the Erdös numbers are, this makes it ... interesting. Sort of like the least interesting number, which ... oh, I'm sure you follow. :)

I was at a dinner event in New Zealand, started talking to this old guy about random topics, and as it turns out... he has an Erdös number of 1. I was definitely a bit floored as he started to describe what they worked on (in person at one point), especially as most of what he spoke of went right over my head. It was a pretty neat and random thing to experience.

As for a "Bacon Number"... I'm giving myself a 1. I actually have a plate of bacon sitting right next to me, and that's the bacon that matters the most.

EDIT: As per jerf (good catch!), I can confirm that I am not actually bacon. I changed my "bacon number" above from 0 to 1.

That would still be 1. To have a bacon (non-capital) number of 0, you would have to be the bacon.

I'm pretty sure there's plenty of a well-marbled tissue where my abs used to be :)

"Be the bacon" I hope someone takes this ad campaign idea and runs with it.

Human meat is often referred to as 'long pig'. That'd be a gutsy campaign.

If you have eaten enough bacon; you are in large quantities, derived from bacon. I think a bacon number of ~0.25 is entirely possible.

I would also like to see it work with Erdös -Bacon numbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s%E2%80%93Bacon_number

erdos-bacon-sabbath http://ebs.rosschurchley.com/

Weird, Adolf Hitler is meant to have a Bacon number of 3, but he doesn't return anything on Google. From the Wikipedia page:

Adolf Hitler was in Ewige Jude, Der (1940) with Curt Bois Curt Bois was in Great Sinner, The (1949) with Kenneth Tobey Kenneth Tobey was in Hero at Large (1980) with Kevin Bacon

I see little need to waste CPU cycles on him, personally.

Google says Justin Bieber's bacon number is 4, but he was in Men In Black III with Josh Brolin and Josh Brolin was in Hollow Man with Keven Bacon.

Turns out that Kevin Bacon is only the 444th best candidate for being the center of a six degrees search of Hollywood.

http://oracleofbacon.org/center.php

The top five best centers for six degrees of hollywood separation are:

   Dennis Hopper (2.802166)
   Harvey Keitel (2.812642)
   Donald Sutherland (I) (2.819748)
   David Carradine (I) (2.819993)
   Udo Kier (2.826828)

I wonder what the cutoff for notability is. It seems to work for big names but not bit part players. Oracle Of Bacon works with all of imdb, but I guess google can't use that resource...

Boo, I have a bit part listed on IMDB and it does not work on my name.

I'm thinking they're using something like wikipedia movie entries as the source. Something that just lists topline cast. As some other threads mention, cameos from even well-known types may not be factored in.

Nothing for Bill Laimbeer.

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&newwindow...

It should be 2.

  William Shatner was in Loaded Weapon 1 (1993)[0] with Denise Richards[1]
  Denise Richards was in Wild Things (1998)[2] with Kevin Bacon

Source: http://www.cs.washington.edu/education/courses/cse373/11wi/h...

[0] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107659/fullcredits#cast

[1] http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000612/

[2] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120890/

Shafter, not Shatner.

This guy is famous in Baconumerology, but I am skeptical that all the links included count as "films".

This isn't William Shatner.

Doesn't work with Erdös number, in case any of you were wondering.

Right. I tried finding out Erdös' Bacon number and nothing came up.

4, if an Erdos/Bacon number were a thing:

P. Erdős and C. Pomerance published "On the largest prime factors of n and n +1"

C. Pomerance and L. Adleman published "On Distinguishing Prime Numbers From Composite Numbers"

L Adleman was a mathematical consultant in Sneakers with David Strathairn.

David Strathairn and Kevin Bacon appeared in The River Wild.

//edit, Randy Pausch actually appeared in a movie so I'm sure there's a connection there, too.

Yes, the elusive Bacon-Erdos number: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erdős–Bacon_number

Hm, it seems like basically any actor you can think of off the top of your head has a Bacon number of 2 (or less). I guess that makes sense. Anyone have some interesting examples of 4+ bacon numbers??

Yeah, I can't get any higher than two... granted, I'm not super up my with Hollywood, but I thought I could get more than that.....

Salvador dali was the only way I could get over 2 (he's 3) in about 5 minutes of trying.

Oh yeah, and stephen hawking is 3.

justin bieber has 4, the largest I found

Justin Bieber (4) - admittedly an edge case, but a popular candidate without close ties (yet). It also includes the "classical baby i ' m grown up now the poetry show" link, with which I wasn't previously familiar.

Justin Bieber is actually a 2. http://oracleofbacon.org/cgi-bin/movielinks?a=Kevin+Bacon...

It's got to be hard to get there if all of the connections are mapped -- I'm a 3. (I worked briefly with Giancarlo Giannini to prep him for his role in the awful Mimic, since I was shining shoes for a living at the time and the producers were willing to give me $200/hr to show him how to hold a brush; Giannini was in Hannibal with Julianne Moore; Moore was in Crazy, Stupid Love with Bacon.)

Robson Green has 3.

David Beckham has a bacon number of 3!

Mark Zuckerberg's Bacon number is 4 Mark Zuckerberg => Ehren McGhehey => Johnny Knoxville => Sarah Jessica Parker => Kevin Bacon

Best I found was Shirley Temple @ 3

Spoiler alert

The highest I can find after some research is a 7. If you want to see it, Rot-13 this: Jvyyvnz Ehshf Funsgre

Edit: I promise this isn't a Rick Roll.

David Mitchell of Peep Show fame has a Bacon number of 3.

Shane Carruth (Primer). His bacon number is 4.

Renée Jeanne Falconetti's Bacon number is 4, best I've found so far.

Edit: apparently William Rufus Shafter's Bacon number is 7.

Taylor Rain's Bacon number is 4

For the curious, confused, or uninitiated, this whole phenomenon is almost certainly based on the coincidence that "separation" and "Kevin Bacon" sound similar, combined with the well-known phrase "six degrees of separation" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_degrees_of_separation). Thus, "six degrees of Kevin Bacon".

Well colour me shocked, I thought I would give Google a workout and try "Orson Welles"... turns out his number is a very run-of-the-mill 2

As are Charlie Chaplin and Alfred Hitchcock (they even share the same Bacon liaison).

It took me a while to find someone with a Bacon number>2: Prince

Try foreign and old actors, e.g. Mazzaropi (famous Brazilian comedian from the 1950'-70's), Google computes a bacon number 5... but The Oracle of Bacon returns 3, they have a bigger database.

I got to 3 with Bela Lugosi. I couldn't get any further, so I finally turned to the comments to see who had >3.

The first one I found was 3: Chip Foose, a car designer. I couldn't think of anyone and he happened to be smiling at me from the calendar on my desk.

Me too. I had to go to foreign child actors. Found a 4 with Kåre Hedebrant who played the kid, Oscar, in "Let the Right One In" (The original swedish version of Let Me In)

Edit: However, oracle of bacon says he's only a 3...

It doesn't appear to work if you are using google (even .com) in another language, confirmed with Spanish (Castilian).

append &hl=en to the URI : https://www.google.com/search?q=Bacon+number+Simon+Pegg&...

Discussion - http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/sep/13/google-six-degree...

Not using IMDB sometimes leads to incorrect results. For "Louis de Funès", Google finds a Bacon number of 3:

Louis de Funès and Terry-Thomas appeared in Don't Look Now... We're Being Shot At!. Terry-Thomas and Tom Aldredge appeared in The Mouse on the Moon. Tom Aldredge and Kevin Bacon appeared in Taking Chance.

The Oracle finds 2: Louis de Funès was in Les aventures de Rabbi Jacob (1973) with Janet Brandt was in Queens Logic (1991) with Kevin Bacon

What would be the most intuitive way to define negative Bacon numbers? If we take this suggestion for negative Erdos numbers (http://infactorium.blogspot.com/2009/01/negative-erdos-numbe...), then this would be people who turned down an offer to star in a movie with Bacon. There must be many people in this category.

I have an Erdös number of the first kind of 2, and an Erdös number of the second kind of at most 3. I'm working on my Bacon number. So far I've appeared on television with: Carol Vorderman, Gareth Jones, Angela Rippon, Fred Dineage, and several others that I need to track down, but are even less well known.

My challenge is working out who I have been with that might have been in a film.

You were juggling on How2?

Yup - "How do you juggle your numbers?" - the SiteSwap notation in action, with the "jugglometer".

It's flawed. Google claims a Bacon number of > 1 for Johnny Carson, Rosie O'Donnell and Jay Leno, but he sat for interviews on their talk shows. Also, the results for some musicians include recorded-footage appearances in movies where they had no interaction with the cast.

Still seems to be just a rather clear distinction between being in a movie or not being in a movie, regardless of significance of the part or role played. To me this doesn't seem like a flaw.

What this tells me is that someone in the Google PR department had an idea, and a bunch of really smart people actually were resourced to work on it. While at the same time, my search results for useful queries have more spam than ever.

Hm.

Hopefully this was a 20% project.

so far, the highest bacon number i've found is from another actor with the last name "Bacon"

https://www.google.com/search?q=bacon+number+lloyd+bacon

Apparently I have a Bacon Number of 4. I dated a girl who was an extra in "Footloose" (2011 remake), with Dennis Quaid, who was in "The Right Stuff" with Fred Ward, who was in "Tremors" with Mr. Bacon.

Neat.

I do too, through actually appearing on film, even.

Ok, videotape. I was in a videotaped school play with someone who according to Oracle of Bacon has a Bacon number of 3. (Google doesn't work since he's pretty obscure, Oracle of Bacon uses all of IMDB I guess.)

Now I just need to find out if I can get an Erdos number out of any of my advisors.

Ahmadinejad is 5 https://www.google.com/#hl=en&output=search&q=Bacon+...

Well, I guess this makes the Oracle of Bacon obsolete. Wonder how those guys feel about this.

Does this mean you can ask Google Now for Bacon numbers?

It worked for me.

There's a Gareth Bacon...

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