PEHI

PEHI

May 25, 2024 | INTERNET, INTERNET, TECHNOLOGY, TECHNOLOGY

Pehi is described as a proximity network.

In what way is this network ‘proximate’? What would you think of?

I found this description:
proximity networks (the networks of friends, neighbours, work colleagues …) represent the potential of relational resources that today’s individual can draw on to meet the challenges of an increasingly complex society.

Pehi may perhaps have something to do with work, but it is independent of colleagues and certainly not a relational resource.

Pehi is a service, which was presented during Venditalia: Vending Exhibition held from 15 to 18 May.

Vending has to do with vending machines, with which I immediately associate coffee vending machines 🙂

This service is a project born from the collaboration between
Confida: Italian Association of Automatic Vending
and
Illimity banking group as PSP: Payment service provider.

Payment service provider corresponds to what we are now used to know as PagoPA i.e. electronic payments by the public administration.

This is the proximity network: the possibility to pay through ATMs.

What do you think?

To do this all you have to do is access the ‘same app you use for food and beverage’ … app that I honestly didn’t know about, to get coffee I’m forever hunting for coins, and you?

I realise we’aren’t in the town here … tell me what the vending machines are like at your place.

If you have the app, just scan the QRcode and you pay ‘in the time of a coffee.’

What do you think?

Pehi is spelled with an h but sounds like the verb to pay.

Do you pehi?

VIRTUAL REFLECTION

VIRTUAL REFLECTION

Apr 28, 2023 | CARS, TECHNOLOGY

Remember when we talked about cooperation? 

We were left with the Improve-ments cue, yet unfortunately my ability to properly follow through on all the things I would like to do has not improved at all.

In any case, there is no use crying over spilled milk assuming you don’t prefer latte 🙂 so in case you missed the post on 2010: Escape from Polis I’ll bring the thread back here as well.

The reflection in question is not metaphorical but virtual.

I am referring to the cameras that some car manufacturers have introduced in place of the classic side glass mirrors.

These mirror cams become another small step in ONLIFE to use an author’s neologism.

Onlife is what is happening and being done as life flows by staying connected to interactive devices.

For now, these are only high-end cars, but do you think that what is still only an option now, could become commonplace for all cars in the future?

Without even talking about cost, the first question that came to my mind is about the consumption that will inevitably reduce battery life.

What is your opinion?

Have you experienced driving using these cams instead of the classic side mirrors?

Do you think you would have difficulty, or do you look forward to this innovation spreading to most vehicles as has already happened with digital dashboards, for example?

Real reflection or virtual reflection?

ChatGPT

ChatGPT

Feb 11, 2023 | TECHNOLOGY

GPT stands for Generative Pretrained Transformer.

Highsounding and even somewhat disturbing terms that “extend their hand” introducing themselves mellowed by the chat prefix.

There is a lot of talk about this “conversational” artificial intelligence able to chat and answer in-depth questions.

The official website lists among ChatGPT’s features the ability to admit mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests.

All of this is done through machine learning using an algorithm trained with “phenomenological data” that is, data collected from interaction with language in a given  environment.

This algorithm is identified by another acronym: NLP short for Natural Language Processing.

Natural language would be “human” language as opposed to text data that no longer relies on predefined patterns but evolves flexibly.

Artificial Intelligence learns from us.

I don’t know about you, but I would have an immediate point to make in this regard.

OpenAI, creator of this system tells:

We launched ChatGPT as a research preview so we could learn more about the strengths and weaknesses of the system and gather user feedback to help us improve its limitations. Since then, millions of people have provided us with feedback, we have made several major upgrades, and we have seen users find value in a wide range of professional use cases, including writing and editing content, brainstorming ideas, helping with programming, and learning new topics.

Let’s try to dwell on the listed features:

– Content drafting and editing: indeed, this system can write text, surely better than me who never turn out to be good to the infamous SEO analysis 🙂

– Brainstorming ideas: at the level of creativity, I think to the possibility to create images by inserting only a few words.

In this sense the storm can occur with the results, as the creators themselves explain in this video

– Learning new topics: it also winks at education by presenting the chances as interactive and accessible to students.

On Feb. 1, however, a “pilot subscription plan”  is released with this premise:

We love our free users and will continue to offer free access to ChatGPT. By offering this subscription price, we will be able to help support the availability of free access to as many people as possible.

But aren’t users teaching?

I was also struck by another clarification posted on the official page ChatGPT Optimizing Language Models for Dialogue, a link leads to “aligning language models” and specifies the following:

We have trained language models that are much better at following user intentions than GPT-3, making them also more truthful and less toxic, using techniques developed through our alignment research. These InstructGPT models, which are trained with humans in the loop, are now deployed as predefined language models on our API.

Less toxic … I suppose toxicity refers to how previous projects have learned even elements let’s say not politically correct.

The difference between man and machine is just that: imperfection.

Am I wrong?

Do you think we will get to the point where we will be the ones learning from AI and not vice versa?

SHADOW

SHADOW

Oct 8, 2022 | TECHNOLOGY

Shadow, what is your first thought?

I start by quoting people: Nick. 

Then random: motors

Music

Movies

I could go on, more and more, would you like to mention other examples as well?

The world is full of shadows …

I wonder how the choice to call Shadow even a computer that can be accessed remotely came about.

It is is a powerful Windows PC that allows to use any kind of application without buying hardware, which as you know, tends to be obsolete very quickly, as well as expensive.

A faculty that opens up a kind of new and important revolution with respect to the use of technology in our daily lives.

Or do you see it more as another standardization?

The obvious and immediate benefits come in the form of being able to operate at maximum power without having to shell out large sums in equipment purchases.

Also at the level of the environment, the exploitation of certain materials would certainly be reduced, and above all, the need for disposal of many devices would be reduced, since everyone would be able to operate with the available device, simply by connecting.

However, connection may also be the first downside: if it goes off, all work would stop.

The same if the “server” would break.

And again: the conditions at the beginning may appear advantageous, but the costs could rise uncontrollably, as we are unfortunately seeing.

So there is a risk of finding oneself regretting the old PC, perhaps slow but working.

Light, or shadow?

While we decide, something “dark” undoubtedly is the cloud!

I can’t help but think about the scene in which Jason Segel yells at Cameron Diaz, “nobody knows what the cloud is!”

The infamous cloud: a kind of black hole where our data ends up, or a valuable opportunity?

To USerS 🙂 the harsh judgment.

SMART CITY

SMART CITY

Sep 3, 2022 | ITALY, JOURNEY FROM MUG TO MUG, TECHNOLOGY

Smart City is a definition that recurs more and more often now.

Smart City is one of the main themes of civics hours in school.

But specifically how do you experience what smart offers in your city?

In your experience, can you tell of an actual improvement in the quality of your life, or is it all still ephemeral in your neck of the woods for now?

In the image I wanted to finally “offer” you a coffee in Piazza Ducale.

But the city of Vigevano offers many other experiences, including virtual ones.

On the City’s website you can check out a Vigevano Smart City dashboard with some options among which I would like to point out the live webcam. 

And when you decide to come and visit our ducal living room, you will have at your disposal these directions that offer the possibility of more information via QR code.

In the same vein, a “digital” bench was inaugurated.

Red, as red is the symbolic color against violence against women. 

The problem is that hand in hand should also be converted the education of citizens, who too often prove to be the exact opposite of smart.

A marker mark was enough to make the QR code illegible.

This tiny stroke actually emblematically represents a great trait that sets us apart, and likewise reveals the weakness on which what should be the future rests ….

VIRTUAL CHILDREN

VIRTUAL CHILDREN

Jul 2, 2022 | TECHNOLOGY

Can we really come to accept the idea of virtual children?

I had already told you about the virtual newscaster who went on air for 70 days without anyone noticing.

But to go so far as to talk about virtual children is far beyond that.

Virtual children or even tamagotchi kids, that is the definition that went viral after the publication of Catriona Campbell‘s book which, however, I have not read. Have you?

Artificial intelligence and Metaverse, two concepts that are gradually entering our lives.

It is these days, for example, the news of the first degree in the Metaverse, although the term Metaverse was coined thirty years ago: in 1992, in the book Snow Crash written by Neal Stephenson. 

His project Lamina1: a Level 1 blockchain created specifically to enhance the open Metaverse, in collaboration with Peter Vessenes, considered a pioneer of cryptocurrencies, and founder of the first Bitcoin company.

Lamina1 therefore envisions itself as the base level for the Open Metaverse, a place that privileges creators, technical and artistic, providing support, spatial computing technology and a community to support those who are building the Metaverse.

Have you already thought about what your avatar might look like?

Having an alter ego still remains quite different from having a virtual child, yet these images show how far the line has already been crossed.

A year ago I was telling you about Gaia X and now we have Baby X

… interact with the computer as if you were interacting with a person are you comfortable with this concept?

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