How to build a human – review

Gemma Chan, a real human and also now a real synth
Gemma Chan, a real human and also now a real synth

Ahead of season 2 of Channel 4’s Humans, they screened a special showing how a synthetic human could be produced.  If you missed the show and are in the UK, you can watch again on 4OD.

Presented by Humans actress Gemma Chan, the show combined realistic prosthetic generation with AI to create a synth, but also dug a little deeper into the technology, showing how pervasive AI is in the western world.

There was a great scene with Prof Noel Sharkey and the self driving car where they attempted a bend, but human instinct took over: “It nearly took us off the road!” “Shit, yes!”.  This reinforced the delegation of what could be life or death decisions – how can a car have moralistic decisions, or should they even be allowed to? Continue reading How to build a human – review

Amazon Echo Dot (second generation): Review

Echo Dot (c) Amazon
Echo Dot (c) Amazon

When I attended the ReWork Deep Learning conference in Boston in May 2016, one of the most interesting talks was about the Echo and the Alexa personal assistant from Amazon.  As someone whose day job is AI, it seemed only right that I surround myself by as much as possible from other companies.  This week, after it being on back order for a while, it finally arrived.  At £50, the Echo Dot is a reasonable price, with the only negative I was aware of before ordering being that the sound quality “wasn’t great” from a reviewer. Continue reading Amazon Echo Dot (second generation): Review

Surface Pro: how I use it – a review

Surface Pro 3I first used the Surface Pro 3 on my trip to Boston to take notes at ReWorkDL rather than scribbling on bits of paper or taking a full laptop and found it to be a great replacement for an A4 notebook, but didn’t really use it to its full potential.  At the start of November, I joined a new company and I’ve been using the Surface exclusively for all my note taking, as well as for studying for my OU Maths modules.

With the recent release of the Surface 4, there may be people wondering if they’re worth it, and what use they’d get out of it.  There are plenty of technical reviews around so I’d suggest using those as a starting point, and if you’re headed out to the sales, you might find my experiences helpful.   Continue reading Surface Pro: how I use it – a review

Girls Can Code – episode 2 thoughts

Alice Levine showing that Girls Can Code
Alice Levine showing that Girls Can Code

After somewhat mixed reviews of last week’s episode I was interested to see whether episode 2 of Girls Can Code had any more emphasis on the coding side.

It started with a comment that the girls were building a tech business rather than actually learning to code themselves.  This justified one of the major criticisms of the show – that it was nothing about coding.  While I’m sure that this was all fixed months ago, I did wonder if the voice over for the start of the show had been rerecorded after the response to the first episode. Continue reading Girls Can Code – episode 2 thoughts

The Gamechangers – BBC Make it Digital Season

Daniel Radcliffe in the Gamechangers (BBC)
Daniel Radcliffe in the Gamechangers (BBC)

After yesterday’s Girls can code the BBC kicked it up a notch with the Gamechangers – a TV movie about Rockstar Games and the controversy around GTA San Andreas.  At the start, it was made clear that Rockstar weren’t involved and that it had been pieced together from court reports and third party interviews.  If you missed it then it’s available on iPlayer for the next month. Continue reading The Gamechangers – BBC Make it Digital Season

The Rabbit who wants to fall asleep – review

Cover of The Rabbit who wants to fall asleep
The Rabbit who wants to fall asleep

Since my daughter was born in 2011, I can count the number of uninterrupted nights’ sleep I’ve had on a very small number of fingers.  She has never subscribed to the 11-16 hours sleep a day that toddlers are supposed to need and has never wanted to miss a thing, stubbornly staying awake until past what I’d consider to be my bedtime, waking up during the night and then again pretty early.  As a result I’ve got used to celebrating if she falls asleep before 11pm 1 and if I get a block of sleep lasting 6 hours or more.

We’ve tried pretty much everything we can think of2 to get her to sleep and, while she’s been well behaved (other than being awake when I’d like a bit of me time),  it’s been frustrating all round.  I’d said on multiple occasions that it would be great if I could hire Derren Brown for an evening just to hypnotise her3 and then I heard about a book that could put any child to sleep… Continue reading The Rabbit who wants to fall asleep – review

Ex Machina – film review

Ava - Ex Machina,  DNA Films, Film4 Productions
Ava – Ex Machina, DNA Films, Film4 Productions

While on my flight to Boston for ReWorkDL I watched Ex Machina the “must see” latest AI film. I’d been warned that it wasn’t very good by my husband (who’d just flown home the day before!) but I thought that since he’d already seen it, I’d better take the chance to watch it since it’s unlikely to be something we’d watch together in the future. If you haven’t seen it, then please be aware that this post does contain spoilers so read on with caution. Continue reading Ex Machina – film review