Babies mistaken for nipples, and my other stories from this week
AI-created cakes, a video game icon returns, and much more.
In the interest of accountability and making sure I publish a newsletter regularly, I’m going to try a weekly round up of some of my favorite stories I wrote over the past seven days, and some things (or in this case one thing) I read that I liked. Read on for a super interesting study (I promise!) on machine learning datasets, using AI to create desserts and Clubhouse clones.
Since this is the first edition, I’ll stretch a little further back into my archives as well for some first impressions of a Video Game and one (1) post about Overwatch.
Things I wrote
MIT study finds labelling errors in datasets used to test AI — Many developers of machine learning and artificial intelligence models use the same datasets to train and test their systems. But many items in those troves of data aren’t labeled properly, which could lead to serious issues. An MIT study delved into datasets used to test ML models, finding errors such as a baby being mislabeled as a nipple.
Google AI is battling a 'Great British Bake Off' winner in a dessert face-off — I love Maltesers and The Great British Bake Off, and I find AI fascinating, so this story was right up my alley. Google developer advocate Sara Robinson created a machine learning model that spat out some new recipe ideas. Robinson adapted those into a brand new concoction that sounds delicious except for the Marmite frosting. Gross. Her recipe is going up against one from last year’s GBBO winner in a battle for dessert supremacy.
Spotify's plans for live audio include its own version of Clubhouse — Clubhouse’s tentacles are everywhere. Twitter and Discord now have their own moderator-led audio chat rooms. Similar features are coming to LinkedIn, Slack, Facebook (apparently) and, as I wrote this week, Spotify. But if more and more people switch to live audio chats to communicate with other people, that raises some critical concerns about accessibility. Lawrence Weru highlighted some of the difficulties that people with speech disorders or hearing impairments may have with these apps.
‘Crash Bandicoot: On The Run’ Is A Fresh, Fun Spin On A Classic Franchise — There’s a new Crash Bandicoot iOS and Android title from Activision’s mobile game wizards King. I got an early hands on and it’s a lot of fun. It looks and sounds fantastic and King did a great job of capturing the spirit of the console games. There’s some free-to-play microtransaction nonsense that’s a bit hard to stomach, but if you can get past that, this is well worth checking out.
‘Overwatch’ Added A Fan-Made Junkrat Spray In The Latest Patch — I don’t plan on delving into Overwatch too much in Pastimes. I’ve got a Forbes blog for that. But I do want to quickly mention this fun story about a fan-made spray Blizzard added to the game. This is the first time Blizzard has added some fan art to the game, and the reason for it is rather lovely.
A thing someone else wrote
In Brazil’s Favelas, Esports Is an Unlikely Source of Hope — For decades, traditional sports have been seen as a golden ticket out of poor communities. It shouldn’t be too surprising that esports are the modern version of that pathway. This is a great look at the hopes and dreams of would-be pros.