A Prototype Sketch

Sketch is set in the modern era. Two men are seen talking.

A: I haven't seen you around lately.

B: Well I've been busy.

A: Doing what?

B: Having sex!

A: Having SEX?

B: Yes, having sex, and in case you're wondering, on a regular basis with a member of the opposite sex. I've discovered a method which enables me to have sex on a regular basis.

A: What! How are you doing it? Is it prostitution? Are you paying money for sex?

B: Well, yes and no. The method is simple, really; I provide food and shelter while the woman provides sex.

A: What! That sounds just like prostitution, except that there's a meal plan thrown into the job entitlements package.

B: No, no, no! The woman also does some menial household chores; it's less of prostitution than general indentureship with a specific clause for coital services.

A: It sounds expensive-

B: No, not really. I'm getting it all in a package-deal sort of thing so it works out cheaper than if I hired a sexual worker every other day. It's quite a steal actually.

A: Hmm, if you're getting a good deal, then someone must be being ripped off somewhere. Clearly any sane woman with any mathematical inclination can see that it is vastly more profitable to leave things to the open market than to adopt this contract.

B: It's not all peaches on my side too. You see, the contract is lifetime-binding; I'll have to provide her upkeep for the rest of my or her life, so at some point this contract becomes more of a liability than a bargain. But I'm getting my lawyer to go through it for any loopholes so that I can divorce myself of any consequences when the time comes.

A: Well, hopefully you succeed. It does sound like a good idea. Any plans to patent the idea and to market it?

B: Of course I have a mind to make some cash off this. I've even been thinking of a name for it- the name's meaningless now, but hopefully when more people know about it it will gain an essence of its own. I call it - Marriage.

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This sketch is still vastly rough; I'll have to polish it up, maybe add a few twists. There are still some directions that I want to go with it. In the meantime, feel free to add any comments on the sketch.

Sharing Communities and Upload Ratio

Bittorent file sharing communities are set up such that files can be shared more efficiently ; selfish agents that download but do not upload can be detected by their poor upload ratio and banned from the community.

It becomes absurd, however, when the minimum sharing ratio is set to a figure greater than 1. Since each uploaded byte must correspond to a downloaded byte, if someone has upload ratio greater than 1, then someone must have downloaded more than uploaded. If an altruist is defined as being an agent with a sharing ratio of greater than 1, then it is clear that any closed community of agents cannot be solely comprised of altruists.

If however the sharing rule is temporarily waived for new agents, say for the first week, then it is possible for everyone to be altruistic, barring new agents. However, this requires a continuous stream of new agents joining the community, which is unfeasible in the extreme run.

Pornographic Classifier

According to a BBC article, China's new "Green Dam Youth Escort" software, intended to serve as a filter for offensive material (such as pornography), has some classification errors. In particular, it was reported that

I went on the internet to check out some animal photos. A lovely little naked pig was sent onto the black list. Pitiful little pig!," read one comment.

"I was curious, so I looked up some photos of naked African women. Oh, they were not censored!

which is amusing to say the least.

The comments do suggest that a key component of their pornographic classifier involves color, specifically the proportion of skin-colored pixels, though this approach apparently has its weaknesses.

Having some experience with image processing as well as classification, there are a few other possible approaches to constructing a pornographic classifier. Rather than using only color information, it might be advisable to perform object recognition to search for a few key areas of interest, i.e. exposed private parts. A combination of shape (since the outlines of some private parts are considerably unique) and color information should be able to identify these body areas with some effectiveness; alternatively, standard object recognition techniques can be used, though these may be more suitable for the specific rather than the general.

Another approach (which is simpler and less accurate) may be to use the color information to generate an outline of the human frame (by segmentation), and to then see how many colors are contained in the frame. The theory is that many colors indicates the presence of clothes; the advantage is that one is unconcerned with the actual skin color itself. Of course, the issue is that whether the segmented region is human- this in itself is a worthy sub-problem, though one workaround is to identify a head region, and if there is none it is not a human.

Generally, though, the problem of creating a classifier to identify pornographic images is considerably difficult. The above ideas may be suitable for images with only one human subject, but the classification task can be made much more difficult by other complications. Such complications include multiple subjects and non-realistic images (i.e. computer generated images or drawings). In fact, circumventing such pornographic classifiers may be extremely simple indeed.

Sunset Showers

I like taking showers before sunset, though explaining why requires a bit of a long tale.

My electric water heater has 4 settings, low, medium, high, and off, and as it often is with factory settings, my preferred setting lies somewhere in between the factory ones. In this case, the low setting gives water that is just a bit cooler than I'll like, while the medium setting is warm but the higher temperature tends to dehydrate the skin. The best things are always in between.

Now, here's the part about the sunset showers. As it is, I live in a high rise apartment, and at a level that is almost near the top floor. For all high rise apartments, water from the piped supply will be pumped and stored in a water tank at the rooftop. This water will subsequently rerouted to the apartments by gravity.

By coincidence, I learnt that the sun has a great effect on the temperature of the water in the tank; in effect, the water tank is acting as a solar tank, albeit one that only raises the water temperature by a few degrees. And fortuitously, the extra few degrees bumps the water temperature (with the electric heater set to low) to my optimal comfort zone.

Thinking back, this was not the first time I've encountered this solar heating effect. A few years back, when I was still an army recruit serving BMT (basic military training), I found that if I managed to rush into the showers first when the sun was still up, the water would be reasonably warm (or at least, not unheated, as it would have been otherwise). Of course, there weren't many opportunities to capitalize on the knowledge, for training usually ending in the late evenings.

The Knife Cuts Both Ways

In latest news, the Singapore government has announced some proposed changes to the electoral system which would increase the minimum number of opposition MPs in parliament to nine (this done by the device of the NCMP). This is intended to increase the range of views heard in parliament.

Would this measure work? Indeed, it seems that the number of alternative views presented would be greatly increased- this from a purely statistical viewpoint, since it is obvious that nine is greater than the number of opposition MPs, elected or otherwise, currently in parliament. And, since opposition MPs tend to be more active in parliamentry debates, one can't help but think that things are likely to be more vibrant.

What's the catch, then? Well, the catch is that the knife cuts both ways. Recall the effective "by-election strategy" employed in the 1991 elections, which resulted in great success for the opposition parties. That success was possible by contesting less than half the seats, and focusing the role of the opposition to be that of a watchdog and a provider of alternative views.

By legislating a significant amount of opposition voices into parliament, one can't help but think that the persuasiveness of the watchdog/alternative views electoral platform is somewhat weakened. However, I doubt that many would find the situation of having 2 elected opposition MPs as being significantly more preferable than the situation of having 9 NCMPs, even considering the reduced powers of a NCMP.

The real question is whether the opposition would lose ground in the next election. Possibly, due to the forementioned weakening of the watchdog/alternative views platform, though I think this might not be such a bad thing. I've always felt a bit ambivalent about the by-election strategy; it is the equivalent of aiming to come in second in a race just to win the second prize. It's not a reliable strategy, and it gives the mixed message of "we are not good enough to run the country, only enough to point out a few weaknesses in policy". The strategy really discounts some of the good work and thought that some parties have put into becoming a viable alternative for the PAP.

Though I suspect that it might be a moment premature, perhaps it's time for opposition parties to step up to the mantle, and present themselves as fully valid alternatives rather than mere complements to the PAP.

Weird Google Searches

Google has a suggestion feature that gives a list of possible searches that you might be looking for; this list is basically compiled from the most common searches. I've been typing random stuff into the Google, trying to see what I'll get. The conclusion: people are weird, sometimes scary.

First up: People are scared of Chinese people. Amusing.

Second tip: One man's meat is another's poison. I'll never eat mold, for sure. But a big red candle !? Seems like Google is available to ghosts as well.

Lastly, I think too many people have iphones. Making the poor assumption that result frequency is related to actual phone ownership rates, about 33% of phones are iphones.

Secret to Happiness

The secret to happiness is rather simple. It requires a bit of brainwashing and/or mind-altering with drugs. The aim is to make you content, regardless of the actual circumstances.

THE SECRET TO HAPPINESS IS CONTENTMENT.

The potential downside is the failure of the mind-altering regime. THIS MUST NEVER HAPPEN! YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!