My Way or My Way... Don't forget to click accept

My Way or my way… Don’t forget to click accept

Did you know upon signing up for World of Warcraft your chat may be “Your written communication may be subject to review, modification, and/or deletion by Blizzard Entertainment without notice to you. Additionally, you hereby acknowledge that Blizzard Entertainment is under no obligation to monitor Chat, and you engage in Chat at your own risk. “? I didn’t think so. Also “no one has the right to "sell" Blizzard Entertainment's content, except Blizzard Entertainment! So Blizzard Entertainment does not recognize any property claims outside of World of Warcraft or the purported sale, gift or trade in the "real world" of anything related to World of Warcraft. Accordingly, you may not sell or purchase virtual items for "real" money or exchange items outside of World of Warcraft. Please note that Blizzard is entitled to and will prevent any such illegal sales.” Now if you and your friend have struck up a pretty good deal that, just so happens to involve “real money” I don’t see where the problem is. That’s because there is no problem, “Note that Blizzard Entertainment either owns, or has exclusively licensed, all of the content which appears in World of Warcraft.” Blizzard Entertainment (owners of WoW)just want a slice of the pie which doesn’t belong to them which in fact isn’t true, Blizzard Entertainment have the rights to do what they please regarding your WoW user as it clearly states in their T&C:

Not only were the terms and condition dreadfully difficult and, long to read (hard to read due to the font being in blue on top of a black background which, made my eyes blur sometimes whilst reading.)I didn’t agree with all of the rules that had stated out and if I wanted to start playing World of Warcraft, there would be no way possible for me to negotiate those terms and conditions what so ever.

So what can we do? We all need to stand up and be united against these senseless ways of agreeing a contract presently. We can do this by conducting a peaceful protest march towards outside the House of Lords, where people all over the country can then air their thoughts out on what exactly they feel about just clicking a box to agree with hundreds of rules. There needs to be some kind of system that allows each and every person to come to their personal terms with the company they are looking to sign up with. We are all different in the world so why should we be allowed different T&Cs which are very reasonable between both us and, the company doing the selling.

When I was in my early teens I signed up to dozens of websites without even glancing at the T&Cs and thought nothing of it. Obviously I wasn’t the only one in the world to have agreed to something I completely didn’t read, many kids the same age as me or even, younger than I was have made that same mistake as me. To be honest though, how many children are do they think is actually going to be read through all of the T&Cs  and, fully understand just exactly what it means?  Blizzard know the vast majority won’t and the very few that do read it, can’t possibly do anything to change a rule even if they wanted to. We all need to voice our thoughts whether it is online, protest or directly said to the MPs change needs to happen.

To support us and get control of our lives’ again checkout our website: www.mytermsandyourconditions.com . No T&Cs to be read here, ‘just be yourself’ is our small print. Twitter and Facebook both are using the same cunning T&Cs where you have to read a long list of their terms and conditions so we neglected to use it. As we read Facebook’s T&Cs we found out that; “For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos (IP content), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP License)”. That is clearly stating that they own everything we post up on ‘our’ Facebook wall also including our pictures, messages and videos. So you might be thinking “okay I don’t like that, I am going to delete my Facebook account”. But think again here’s the rest of rule 1 and rule 2 “This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it.

When you delete IP content, it is deleted in a manner similar to emptying the recycle bin on a computer. However, you understand that removed content may persist in backup copies for a reasonable period of time (but will not be available to others). ” So even when you try to delete your account you can’t. And just who exactly is the backup files for if our friends can no longer view them? A lot of questions need to be answered for so please, join us today to put an end to these irrational rules which are playing with our lives from a simple tick of a box.

Our website: www.mytermsandyourconditions.com

References from:

http://en-gb.facebook.com/legal/terms

http://eu.blizzard.com/en-gb/company/legal/wow_tou.html

Digital Mind

In this week’s blog,I will be looking at robots and artificial Intelligences (A.I.) across the world today and, try to find out why we make them and what it means for society on a whole. Firstly I have to look at just what exactly the two terms mean; National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) define robots as; “Robotics is the study of robots. Robots are machines that can be used to do jobs. Some robots can do work by themselves. Other robots must always have a person telling them what to do.”- Reference from: http://www.nasa.gov/audience/foreducators/robotics/home/what_is_robotics_58.html. It is really strange that before deciding to use NASA’s definition of robots I search the internet and, many different websites and companies had different terms and definitions for the word robot. This just shows that they is many different types of robots out today, not as people may think they look like but they all do many different things. But one thing that was clear in all most all definitions of the word is that, the robots’ main objective is to work for or, with humans.  The term I understand to define Artificial Intelligence is “The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.”- Reference from Google dictionary. Robots and A.I. generally have the same job in this world which is to serve humans or, assists them in their needs but, for how long? Every year scientists are progressing into making these machines smarter more intelligent and maybe, they will have equal rights to us or even more important than we are if, it their intelligence continues to progress.

There are many different types of robots that roam the earth and parts of Space in this present time. The vast amount of robots that are present in today world as I mentioned before, make it quite difficult for us to give the word a precise definition of the term. Due to many science fiction movies we all have an idea of just what we think a robot is, due to us being bombarded with Hollywood’s ideas and imaginations. Before researching my thought of robots had to come across looking like; Robo Cop, The Terminator, look like the robots in I, Robot or even, Transformer cars. All of the examples just given either look like a human or function by themselves very intelligently. However there is much more to a robot than just its looks, for example NASA use their robots to send them to Mars to gather information about the planet. Also there are robots that design to counteract and defuse bombs and explosives at war, to avoid human fatalities.

As you can see from the images above neither one of the images appear to look like Hollywood’s idea of what robots look like but, they are still considered to be robots. Which obviously draws me to think that many things in the world today can operate in the world today using its own intelligence, to assist humans in day to day life such as; Satellite Navigation systems, Siri on iPhones and, machines that use voice recognition. Robots are amongst us very much today and we hardly notice to them for what they truly are.

On the other hand Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) is considered to be “It is the science and engineering of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computer programs. It is related to the similar task of using computers to understand human intelligence, but AI does not have to confine itself to methods that are biologically observable.” Reference from:  http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/whatisai/node1.html.  Artificial intelligence tends to have the appearance of human beings even possessing skin like material to protect their circuitry.  Having witnessed various forms of artificial intelligence on YouTube I find them rather disturbing on how, amazingly they seem to resemble human being and some traits they have learnt. My thoughts of A.I. are that if they progress to a certain level that is beyond human intelligence, what happens next? An extract from Wikipedia also details this more: “Artificial Intelligence is a common topic in both science fiction and projections about the future of technology and society. The existence of an artificial intelligence that rivals human intelligence raises difficult ethical issues, and the potential power of the technology inspires both hopes and fears.

In fiction, Artificial Intelligence has appeared fulfilling many roles, including a servant (R2D2 in Star Wars), a law enforcer (K.I.T.T. "Knight Rider"), a comrade (Lt. Commander Data in Star Trek: The Next Generation), a conqueror/overlord (The Matrix, Omnius), a dictator (With Folded Hands), a benevolent provider/de facto ruler (The Culture), an assassin (Terminator), a sentient race (Battlestar Galactica/Transformers/Mass Effect), an extension to human abilities (Ghost in the Shell) and the savior of the human race (R. Daneel Olivaw in Isaac Asimov's Robot series).

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein considers a key issue in the ethics of artificial intelligence: if a machine can be created that has intelligence, could it also feel? If it can feel, does it have the same rights as a human? The idea also appears in modern science fiction, including the films I Robot, Blade Runner and A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, in which humanoid machines have the ability to feel human emotions. This issue, now known as "robot rights", is currently being considered by, for example, California's Institute for the Future, although many critics believe that the discussion is premature.[170] The subject is profoundly discussed in the 2010 documentary film Plug & Pray.” –Reference from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence.  Though I think in the world today the Artificial intelligence that ordinary people of today witness it is still very vague in the world today or, very basic in how it works i.e. Eliza, ‘Eliza is a chatterbot computer application which gives you an impression that it is engaging in conversation with you when really, it is programed to respond to certain words that you input to keep the conversation going.’  But saying this what scientist are working on currently and aren’t very far from perfecting is only around the corner. Here are some videos I found on the web:

On a whole i think that humans can benefit from integrating with robots in our everyday lives' as they seem to be very useful and powerful tools in our lives' today but, on the other hand Artificial intelligence has a different effect for me. I do not see the need or the benefit for scientist to make A.I.  there are billions of humans on the planet today so, the need to make substitute human replacements bewilders me. 

Digital Body

In this blog I am going to discuss the most important aspect in our life which is; life itself.  Some scientists around the world are looking at the possibility of uploading the human mind on to computers for memory use like a hard drive or, even crazy ideas which I am going to talk about.

Mind upload is where a human uploads his or her conscious mind to a computer system where, the device would store or would operate as if it were a genuine human brain. “The computer would have to run a simulation model so faithful to the original that it would behave in essentially the same way as the original brain, or for all practical purposes, indistinguishably. The simulated mind is assumed to be part of a virtual reality simulated world, supported by an anatomic 3D body simulation model. Alternatively, the simulated mind could be assumed to reside in a computer inside (or connected to) a humanoid robot or a biological body, replacing its brain.” Reference from: Wikipedia.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_uploading. Naturally to me that sounds crazy and out of this world and then, I thought who in their right minds would want to do that? Surely enough I got think of the slight benefits.

The factor of uploading someone’s whole memory to a computer doesn’t seem like such a bad idea if for example; a person is suffering from brain damage due to that, their mind is no longer operating like how it once used to. The convenience of having already stored that person’s brain on to a computer would be such a relief for the family and friends of the injured person. Also without our mind being in our bodies anymore and, the use of a computer processing information stored on a hard disk the capability of us becoming immortal is very likely. The computer brain could remain for as long as it can amongst us continuing to learn and improve as time goes on.

Even though I said immortality could be a benefit who would actually want to live forever? Watching everyone you’re close to die whilst you still live on won’t be very fun. Yes maybe you might make new friends and meet all your descendants, but surely by then you would have had enough of life by then. Another main factor of life that makes us all human is the uncertainty of death. We all have the sense of confusion and slight fear of dying as we do not know what, lays ahead for us after we go. Thereby by removing that element of fear of dying and, never living again surely dehumanising into fearless robot.  This then also makes you think who would want to live forever? I can only think that maybe just the rich and, famous would want to do it or even, could afford it but I can think of another reason why someone would want to.

Another aspect of mind uploading will be essentially how this new brain will work compared to the old one. Our minds’ are very powerful things allowing us to; think, remember, talk and, sense things around us. But the adjustment of mind uploading could benefit the users by “could potentially think much faster than a human even if it were no more intelligent. Human neurons exchange electrochemical signals with a maximum speed of about 150 meters per second, whereas the speed of light is about 300 million meters per second, about two million times faster. ”- Reference from: Wikipedia.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_uploading. This would mean the encounters with super intelligent human being which leads into singularity.

“Singularity is the technological creation of smarter-than-human intelligence. There are several technologies that are often mentioned as heading in this direction. The most commonly mentioned is probably Artificial Intelligence, but there are others: direct brain-computer interfaces, biological augmentation of the brain, genetic engineering, ultra-high-resolution scans of the brain followed by computer emulation. Some of these technologies seem likely to arrive much earlier than the others, but there are nonetheless several independent technologies all heading in the direction of the Singularity – several different technologies which, if they reached a threshold level of sophistication, would enable the creation of smarter-than-human intelligence.”- Reference from http://singularity.org/what-is-the-singularity/. More of what exactly singularity is and means can be found on the link stated above.  What I think of a half-man, half-machine walking around is much undecided. I Say this because, sure it would be great having lots of helpful A.I (Artificial Intelligence) amongst us but, how long will it be till they learn too much and turn against us like in the film; I, Robot, (2004).

Whilst researching I came across a website that details key features that I agree with that, highlights why mind uploading would not be such a good thing: http://dvice.com/archives/2010/07/6-reasons-why-y.php. Point 3 is a factor that I agree with strongly. Point 3 assumes that the energy demand is going to be insanely high is a very valid point. If everyone is uploading their minds to computer the world would surely be going against all energy saving plans, already in place.

To conclude I think that maybe the idea of mind uploading and singularity is taking technology a bit too far and that, if plans are successful by means of mind uploading, what lies ahead after that? We will no longer see the need to reproduce or even live in our normal lives and, will be trapped living in a digital world just like avatars. Computers will probably go on to become more significant than actual humans, which could be a real nightmare. Humans could lose all connections with our past and although, we might live forever and may turn out to be super intelligent, it isn’t being human and I think it is the most important of all regardless of any technological progress. Through the history technology, computer interfaces have become more advanced, smaller and smarter. I don’t think it should be the case that to better technology we ourselves should become the next interfaces for technology.