Locutius #20
Privacy, Machine Learning, and Policing
First, civil rights groups are calling for an ethical review of Axon’s police technology (read the letter). Here’s how Axon describes themselves:
We are Axon, a team committed to pushing the boundaries of technology to help you feel more confident in the field, at the station, and in court. From Smart Weapons, like our TASER devices, to police body cameras and digital evidence management systems, every product works together as a single network.
Axon’s latest technology is automatic face recognition on the footage captured by police video cameras. The ethics group is concerned that “Real-time face recognition could also prime officers to perceive individuals as more dangerous than they really are and to use more force than the situation requires.” We’re all living in the Terminator 2 timeline now.
Someday I’ll write a fun newsletter about how the first example of AR in Terminator 2 is FASHION, but for now let’s discuss abusive policing!
A service meant to monitor inmates’ calls can track you.
You have nothing to fear if you haven’t broken the law, right? Wrong! What if your stalker is in law enforcement? Or your abusive ex-husband is a cop? Domestic violence is 2 to 4 times more common in police families vs. US families in general (source). You don’t even have to be a victim of domestic violence to be harmed by this system. You could be a judge! Yep, the New York Times reports that a sheriff in Missouri used this location-finding service, offered by Securus, to track the location of a judge. Have a phone? You don’t have privacy. Securus says:
“Securus is neither a judge nor a district attorney, and the responsibility of ensuring the legal adequacy of supporting documentation lies with our law enforcement customers and their counsel,”
Well, that’s one way to abrogate responsibility. Also, I’m updating my movie references. This privacy issue is literally the plot of Charlie’s Angels (2000).
If you read one research paper this week…
Make it this one from Roger K. Moore: Appropriate Voices for Artefacts: Some Key Insights. In the paper, Moore discusses the inappropriate use of human voices for voice interfaces.
evidence suggests that the usage of such voice-enabled devices is surprisingly low, perhaps due to noise in the environment, privacy concerns or manual alternatives.. Another possible contributing factor is that the ubiquitous deployment of inappropriate humanlike voices for non-living artefacts might deceive users into overestimating their capabilities, thereby creating a conflict of expectations that ultimately leads to a breakdown in communications
The paper is just 4 pages long, but includes a series of illuminating studies on the use of obviously synthetic voices in a variety of voice interfaces. Read it: http://vihar-2017.vihar.org/assets/papers/VIHAR-2017_paper_8.pdf
Here are three of my favorite videos from Google I/O:
Add transactional capabilities to your Actions /// Google Devs on YouTube
The value of immersive design sprints (Sumier is such a talented, thoughtful designer, so I was excited to see him on stage) /// Google Devs on YouTube
What’s new in WearOS - A member of the DialogFlow team tracked me down (in person!) the other day because they wanted to check in on how my developer experience was going. I. Was. Stunned. Have an issue with something in DialogFlow? Get in touch with them because they want to improve their tools! (How many teams at Google have a “contact us” email? DialogFlow has multiple contact avenues!) /// Google Devs on YouTube
Alexa updates
Amazon Alexa Skills to Support Multiple Voices /// Voicebot.ai
Alexa, I Don't Trust You To Be My Shopping Assistant Only 3 in 10 people have made a purchase via their Assistant, which is interesting because people..trust Amazon? If you ever see me at a conference, ask me about the time I set up Dominos easy order on Alexa and my family ate only Dominos pizza for a month. It was a dark time in the Jones household. /// Statista
Now You Can Visit an Amazon Alexa Smart Home to Try Out Alexa There’s also supposedly an Alexa in my local Whole Foods, so I’ll need to go check that out, too. /// Voicebot.ai
Amazon Echo That Records Kids Draws Concern From U.S. Lawmakers Amazon has promised not to use the records for any marketing or advertising purposes—only for improving the device’s functionality. /// Gizmodo
Experts say ‘Keep Amazon Alexa away from your kids’ Interesting: Amazon says “Technology– in general – isn’t a replacement for parenting or social connection.” and here’s an interesting piece from Cathy Pearl on The Societal Benefits of Smart Speakers /// The Intercept
Amazon is building a 'health & wellness’ team within Alexa as it aims to upend health care I became really interested in the future of VUIs when I was a new mom, so I get why Amazon is starting there - you don’t have a free hand! /// CNBC
HP made an all-in-one PC with Alexa built in Desktop PCs are always plugged in, so they can be always-on speakers. /// The Verge
‘Alexa’ has become a less popular baby name since Amazon launched Echo Siri’s never been a popular name, but Alexa has declined in popularity by 33% since the Echo launched /// Recode
Locutius Links
This $2 Billion AI Startup Aims to Teach Factory Robots to Think Preferred Networks is Japan’s #1 startup, it’s only publicly available product is a manga-coloring app, and Toyota is betting on them to move ahead with driverless cars* ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ /// Bloomberg
95% of ATM transactions pass through COBOL programs JFC /// The Increment
The Unforgiving Math That Stops Epidemics The way to my heart isn’t my stomach, it’s my brain. And specifically, it’s sending me articles and books about epidemics and how they’re stopped. /// Quanta Magazine
Hospital sound design can be deadly Ooooh, this is a neat one /// Fast Company
Alexa and Siri Can Hear This Hidden Command. You Can’t. “My assumption is that the malicious people already employ people to do what I do,” said one of the researchers. /// New York Times
Facial Recognition and “ethnicity” (I’m making the Scully face again.) The blog post about this tech is an easy read and worth your time /// Geoff White, Tech Journalist
How frightened should we be of AI? /// New Yorker
Very frightened, says Kissinger (yes, that Kissinger) /// The Atlantic
Microsoft announces Xbox Adaptive Controller for players with disabilities It has 19 jacks so that you can customize the device to your needs. /// The Verge
Scientists Sucked a Memory Out of a Snail and Stuck It in Another Snail The memory was about getting an electrical shock to the butt. Really. /// Live Science What you can’t see right now is me making this face:
A few favorite books about epidemics and biology
I find single-subject history books irresistible and that’s why I read Blood: An Epic History of Medicine and Commerce. I learned so much about plasma on the battlefield. And French prisoners.
Flu: The Story Of The Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus that Caused It by Gina Kolata. I picked this up at PDX a decade ago and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
Viruses are fascinating. They’re alive! But they’re not alive! They are the Schrodinger's cat of disease. If you want to get a good intro to viruses, I recommend The Invisible Enemy: A Natural History of Viruses by Dorothy Crawford. The writing is snappy, you're going to learn a lot about viruses from this book and it is going to freak you out. In a good way.
If you’re curious about how we stopped smallpox, read The Demon in the Freezer, from the man who wrote The Hot Zone (who is also the brother of the man who wrote a novel about a dinosaur sort of thing that comes to life and starts killing people in a museum (yes, I read that too, I will literally read *anything* that is made of words.)
Until next week!
Abi Jones Editor, Locutius
Is there something I missed? Want to chat? I’m on Twitter at @jonesabi Yes, this newsletter contains affiliate links. Finally, the opinions in this newsletter are mine, not my employer’s.