Latest Blog Entries by jwray at VideoSift.com

ACORN

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 23:31:51 -0700

(2 comments - 103 views)

IIRC, entire ACORN scandal consists of:

1. Out of 2 million low-income voters registered, a small percent of the workers turned in bogus forms with bogus names like Captain Crunch. Acorn was required by law to turn in ALL of the forms rather than arbitrarily discarding some of the forms at their discretion (because if the law were otherwise, people who register voters could throw away half the forms and disenfranchise half the people who thought they had registered). Not one vote is known to have been cast under any of these bogus registration attempts.

2. Some people dressed up as OBVIOUSLY fake pimps and prostitutes, strolled into dozens of ACORN branches until they found someone who put them on (OBVIOUSLY bullshitting them) and they took it completely seriously. Later, they took the videos credulously to Fox news, which also believed every word in the videos was serious, because they're a bunch of morons with no sense of humor.

3. Republicans have a ragefest and try to treat organizations as guilty until proven innocent if any ONE of their employees has been indicted for fraud (i.e. arbitrarily accused by one prosecutor, not yet put on trial or anything). This rule inadvertently bars the gov't from funding a shitload of defense contractors, but that part is not really going to be enforced, because all they really wanted was an unconstitutional bill of attainder against ACORN.

Am I missing something?

- jwray

broadcast vs. timeshift / web video

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 23:51:12 -0700

(5 comments - 156 views)

TiVo and downloaded video are very convenient, but I've been thinking about some possible benefits of watching actual broadcasts:

1. You don't get a rewind/pause and you know it, so it forces you to actually focus on the program for a continuous block of time.

2. You get up and walk around every commercial break (which is like every 10 minutes).

With tivo/web:

1. You don't have to focus on it because you can ignore it and rewind or pause and use IM or go to some other website , so ADHD is multiplied by over 9000. It may take days to finish a 1 hour video.

2. You are less likely to get up and stretch.

I haven't watched broadcasts in months, but I haven't literally thrown away my TV yet.

- jwray

The MMORPGification of games (NSFW)

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 01:04:55 -0700

(11 comments - 426 views)

It seems like every fucking game is trying to incorporate features of MMORPGs. Back in the good old days skill-based games like starcraft, counter-strike, AOE II, and CivII were kept entirely separate from grind-based games like everquest. Then WC3 came along as an RTS with "hero units" that "level up" and all that MMORPG bullshit. Age of Mythology did the same shit. The civilization series felt that "veteran" units weren't enough and invented a whole BS tech tree of level-ups for units. Age of Empires III implemented unlockable shit that totally unbalanced the RTS. TF2 (Valve's next significant fps after counter-strike source) started out as a pure skill game but then for some inexplicable reason they decided to mingle it with MMORPG bullshit through an achievement system that unlocked additional items. Now it is no longer a pure SKILL game, but is based heavily on how much time you spent GRINDING on achievement servers for the limited-availability items.

Now, I've got nothing against MMORPGs themselves. I just like to keep that kind of crap SEPARATE from my FPS and RTS games. Nowadays, almost every new FPS or RTS game throws in some unlockable bullshit that upsets the perfect balance (think original starcraft) that a game is supposed to have. This really irritates me. I play these games for a change of pace from WoW, not to do the same shit.

- jwray

supermarket wtf

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 01:47:58 -0700

(14 comments - 379 views)
Why does a loaf of bread cost twice as much as a dozen eggs, even though ecology dictates it must take an order of magnitude more grain to feed the hens to produce the eggs? Government subsidies? Inefficient markets?

- jwray

All your sifts belong to Stephen Fry

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 23:16:23 -0700

(10 comments - 379 views)

- jwray

When temporal arbitrage becomes a ponzi scheme

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Thu, 07 May 2009 08:55:04 -0700

(2 comments - 407 views)
The title of a book somebody should write about tulip mania, housing bubbles, and stock bubbles.

- jwray

food ideas

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Mon, 04 May 2009 16:12:48 -0700

(7 comments - 323 views)

Good Cheap stuff:

water

eggs

rice

bananas

mixed nuts

dried papayas

Good Medium-priced stuff:

Milk

Apples

Turkey

Chicken

Dark Chocolate

Whole wheat bread

Expensive stuff:

Guacamole

Stuff to minimize because it's unhealthy:

all soft drinks

all alcohol

all caffeine (except dark chocolate)

most chips / pretzels

most restaraunts

Beef

Pork/Ham/Bacon

hot pockets and similar crap

ice cream / candy

desserts in general

Stuff to avoid because it tastes/feels like shit:

Broccoli

Cabbage

Green Beans

Alcohol

Stuff to avoid because it's overpriced:

almost all restaraunts

Pizza

Processed/prepared foods

Alcohol

- jwray

Sweden 1, USA 0

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 09:40:57 -0700

(0 comments - 557 views)

http://www.videosift.com/video/The-Daily-Show-4-21-09-The-Stockholm-Syndrome#comment-742409

- jwray

Michio Kaku = media whore, not scientist

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 20:27:03 -0700

(9 comments - 530 views)
The many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is the ultimate violation of Occam's Razor. It's totally unsubstantiated speculation. You might as well be theorizing about the flying spaghetti monster.

- jwray

Vote Snowballing and Countermeasures

jwray (http://jwray.videosift.com) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 09:47:41 -0700

(3 comments - 583 views)

The Trouble is that ranking order determines the number of views, which determines the vote count, which determines the ranking order. This is self-reinforcing, and amplifies random noise such as the number of people who were online at the time the video was submitted. To get a more accurate ranking of videos there are some countermeasures we might try:

0. Introduce some randomness to the default sort order

1. Each view of a video (from a distinct user) subtracts a small fraction from its vote count

2. Only videos found through searching or "random" mode can be voted. If a user arrives at a video through a top-list, he cannot vote for it. Videosift doesn't have enough traffic volume to try this approach, but YT does.

- jwray