That makes more sense to me.
164 karma · joined May 8, 2011
Nonetheless, I am continuously astounded by the number of typewriters still in use.
Look around, computers have been more intelligent than humans in many different domains for decades. Computers can solve complex equations billions of times faster than humans, they can play chess better than people that have dedicated their entire lives to mastering the game, they can sift through the information of billions of websites in hundredths of a second, they can answer obscure and complex questions better than the best Jeopardy players, they can accurately model extremely complex systems like the world's weather, and the list goes on and on and on.
But guess what, your calculator isn't plotting to kill you because unlike humans it hasn't been programmed to do that. There may come a time when someone is evil or careless enough to program these traits into a machine capable of acting on them, but this is a game humans (and life in general) have been playing for a very long time, and we're very good at it. Good luck programming a billion years of evolution based learning into your calculator.
The worst thing is this kind of crap is very effective. Look at Zynga, they've built a billion dollar company out of it.
I am concerned about the complexity of this approach though and I don't think the concessions we're doing away with are that terrible. How meaningful is it to be rank 5623 vs. rank 5249, or even rank 2519? I don't think people can make much sense of ranks beyond 100, but maybe I'm wrong. I would rather break rankings into smaller groups. Which is more interesting, being ranked 23,528 worldwide, or being the town champion? I think the latter is much more meaningful to a person.