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Hey everyone, I'm currently doing my PhD looking at online citizen journalism - specifically ways of getting different ideological groups to work together in a way that doesn't 1) end up like Twitter, where on anything major it's just constant arguments and 2) end up like Reddit, where minority viewpoints get shouted down and eventually stop posting. Right now I'm running an experiment to see if an algorithm can group together similar sentiment in news comments. If anyone is interested in participating (it'd be a huge help) - go to http://research.jscott.me. It'll take 15 minutes or so and you get to read CNN/Telegraph comments from UKIPers - yay! Early next year I'll be running an experimental open/unmoderated liveblog around some key UK events (e.g. the events leading up to the general election) where people from different ideological groups will be asked to update the liveblog (much like people post news & opinion in this thread). The people in this thread seem pretty clued up and interested in the news so it might be something you'd be interested in. If so send me a PM and I'll get in touch when it starts 
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Aug 25, 2014 18:25
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an algorithmic way of sidestepping the polarization in social networks? huh. could you spare some time to explain your model, or is it too complicated
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Aug 25, 2014 19:05
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ronya posted:an algorithmic way of sidestepping the polarization in social networks? huh. could you spare some time to explain your model, or is it too complicated Actually, I don't want to sidestep polarisation - I want to embrace it. My goal is to encourage a load of different viewpoints and present them fairly (multi-perspectival news) - so the reader can judge them. This is opposed to trying to come up with a middle-of-the-road story which presents itself as an unbiased telling of the facts - or use a human editor to pick out representative viewpoints. The problem I see with current systems that allow anyone to contribute (e.g. Reddit, Twitter) is that they either shout down minority viewpoints, leading to those either not being seen or the authors giving up entirely - or have so little structure that it's not possible to use it as an actual news source. What I'm hoping to do is automatically identify the major sentiment groups and then summarise the arguments from each position (using votes within each group to identify representative opinions from those groups). I hope that with this, holders of minority viewpoints will be more likely to volunteer their opinions/experiences as they know they'll be fairly represented. The current experiment is trying out a very simple algorithm for identifying sentiment groups in news comments using the social graph. I expect it's probably too simple and will need more work but there's no way to know until I get the data The goal though is to automatically identify these sentiment groupings - which I can then use in my next system.
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Aug 25, 2014 20:01
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While were on the subject of academia, has anyone got any tips for writing a "Statement of Purpose" for a masters application? As somebody who is not all that self-promoting, I'm having a hard time getting it right.
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Aug 25, 2014 20:09
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Pork Pie Hat posted:Security services close to identifying jihadi killer of James Foley Forensic linguistics/dialectology? Maybe if they can pinpoint where 'Jihadi John' grew up from his accent and speech patterns they can compare that to known UK Jihadis. I vaguely remember seeing a documentary about one forensic linguist who was able to, iirc, differentiate the difference in accents between streets in East London.
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Aug 25, 2014 20:30
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Mr Cuddles posted:Why not check bellingcat? It's getting DDoS'd by *persons unknown*. Which isn't suspicious at all.
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Aug 25, 2014 20:45
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Out of curiosity, are you guys down south being shown the Scotland debate? I heard that the last one was only available online.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:01
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Heisenberg1276 posted:Actually, I don't want to sidestep polarisation - I want to embrace it. My goal is to encourage a load of different viewpoints and present them fairly (multi-perspectival news) - so the reader can judge them. This is opposed to trying to come up with a middle-of-the-road story which presents itself as an unbiased telling of the facts - or use a human editor to pick out representative viewpoints. ah, is the assessment of poles calculated using network graphs or? identifying camps and then picking highly-rated views from each?
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Aug 25, 2014 21:02
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Kin posted:Out of curiosity, are you guys down south being shown the Scotland debate? I heard that the last one was only available online. It's on BBC2. I'm watching it through iPlayer and thus nominally the rUK version.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:02
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I'm watching it at my parents' in Switzerland on BBC2.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:05
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ronya posted:ah, is the assessment of poles calculated using network graphs or? identifying camps and then picking highly-rated views from each? That's essentially the idea. Then apply some summarisation techniques occasionally to bring everything in line - as existing liveblogs do. For the sentiment grouping - I'm trying as much as possible to avoid content-based techniques because in my experience they're a nightmare to work with.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:08
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Zero Gravitas posted:While were on the subject of academia, has anyone got any tips for writing a "Statement of Purpose" for a masters application? As somebody who is not all that self-promoting, I'm having a hard time getting it right. Generally a statement of purpose/intent is a letter that provides an overview of a) why you're interested in whatever course it is you're studying for, and b) why you're suited to it. It's a little bit self-promotion and a little bit research. A rough template might be something along the following lines: - 1. Brief introduction of yourself, along with details of your first degree (including any subjects you excelled at, particularly if they're pertinent to the field of postgraduate study). 2. Reason why you've applied for/are applying for the particular course, indicating how it fits with your interests and the knowledge you developed during your undergraduate studies. 3. A little about the institution's other offerings that attract you - a particular research cluster, activity that may be offered for postgraduate students, the possible intention of going on to further study there (e.g. PhD study, should you be interested). 4. Any other details about yourself that might be pertinent to the position being advertised, particular academic strengths (in law, for example, this might include having taken part in mooting, working for a student law review, doing some pro bono work, or in engineering it might include participating in a student competition, being awarded some sort of prize, or a vertically-integrated project or something). 5. Finally, without coming across as obsequious, if there is a particular person working at that institution that has attracted you to the place, mention it. However, when doing this you should refer to their attributes, key papers or something else that demonstrates why, rather than 'this person is a big name', or 'I'm just trying to get into this institution'. If you're not really familiar with the work of anyone there, don't include this part. I realise this is a bit vague - if you provide a little more information about the course I could try to be a bit more specific. Alternatively, if you want to send a PM, I could always look over a draft.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:25
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Has the entire Scottish independence debate been this angry? I feel like both sides are preaching to each other's choirs at this stage.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:44
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tdrules posted:Has the entire Scottish independence debate been this angry? I feel like both sides are preaching to each other's choirs at this stage. Mostly just between the politicians and on the internet. In person, people are much more flexible unless they're abhorrently bullheaded and refuse to conceed their opinion might be wrong on things (i've a couple of people in my work like this).
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Aug 25, 2014 21:52
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Hooo another woman giving Darling a hiding. Fighting for his job, indeed. EDIT: Whoops, just noticed this was in the wrong thread. Coohoolin fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Aug 25, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 21:54
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Coohoolin posted:Hooo another woman giving Darling a hiding. Fighting for his job, indeed. Yeah, I feel the audience has been composed mostly of yes supporters tonight. How is the audience selection process for this kind of thing conducted? Do you just apply for tickets.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:57
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Kin posted:Yeah, I feel the audience has been composed mostly of yes supporters tonight. How is the audience selection process for this kind of thing conducted? Do you just apply for tickets. They said it was weighted by ComRes at the beginning plus a few questions the BBC selected from online submissions. No idea about the process itself, but there is one.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:01
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Kin posted:Yeah, I feel the audience has been composed mostly of yes supporters tonight. How is the audience selection process for this kind of thing conducted? Do you just apply for tickets. ComRes selected the 200 audience members.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:02
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Kin posted:Yeah, I feel the audience has been composed mostly of yes supporters tonight. How is the audience selection process for this kind of thing conducted? Do you just apply for tickets. The No camp in the audience will be full of Glasgow Labour, which might be okay for them on questions like the Currency, but on anything to do with Privatisation or Labour's incompetence Darling might as well be staring at a room solely of SNP supporters. twoot fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Aug 25, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 22:55
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HortonNash posted:Forensic linguistics/dialectology? Maybe if they can pinpoint where 'Jihadi John' grew up from his accent and speech patterns they can compare that to known UK Jihadis. Forensic linguistics/phonetics/dialectology is not very good at confirming location (from what I remember of studies it's about 40% sucess rate with good samples etc). Being able to distinguish between accents is very different than being able to conclusively state that because someone's accent has elements of X accent that they are definitely there. The Aus government does these for asylum seekers and they're usually wrong, especially when a dialect/language is spoken in multiple countries or adjoining cross boarder areas. They will probably be using voice prints (spectrogram) to match a super huge corpora of recorded calls from mobiles, which if they make guesstimates about who it's likely to be/not be would probably give them OK results. Problem is if the samples aren't good, or they do creaky voice. You can id people doing stupid accents or pretending to be the opposite sex, but making that stupid noise and it buggers it all up. Or having a cold. Alternatively if they had enough material they could try and do a kind of spoken authorship analysis and match the words and phrases he uses to other samples they have. I would think that this would cause problems though since it's a kind of propaganda video, so have a high number of set phrases or slogans, so you'd probably just end up identifying the group, rather than the individual in the U.K.
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Aug 25, 2014 23:06
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And if/when our homegrown headchopper is identified/located, what then? A stern telling off? is his passport going to be super-double ripped up no returns? send in AAAR BRAVE BOYS for an extra-judicial killing? Give it a year, and the government will probably be making under the table deals with ISIS and talking about how the enemy of our enemy is our friend even if they are genocidal fuckwits, just like they are now with Assad.
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Aug 26, 2014 00:14
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DesperateDan posted:And if/when our homegrown headchopper is identified/located, what then? A stern telling off? is his passport going to be super-double ripped up no returns? send in AAAR BRAVE BOYS for an extra-judicial killing? I don't think at any point our government had said Assad is our friend. I think they've made it pretty clear the only 'help' he's going to receive is the indirect benefits of outside forces fighting ISIS. No need to use hyperbole.
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Aug 26, 2014 07:12
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HortonNash posted:Forensic linguistics/dialectology? Maybe if they can pinpoint where 'Jihadi John' grew up from his accent and speech patterns they can compare that to known UK Jihadis. That was Professor Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady. Until about 20 years ago it was certainly possible to get fairly close to the borough, perhaps the parish, of someone from London from there speech but nowadays between the gentrification of London pushing people out, and television homogenising accents generally it's much, much harder. (You can still roughly tell the difference between east and south London and occasionally a traditional accent manages to stick around - it was always strange to hear Patsy Palmer and Martine McCutcheon on EastEnders with their actual authentic Bethnal Green accents, especially against the background of Estuary English and Dick van Dyke bollocks that make up the supposed Cockney accents in that show)
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Aug 26, 2014 07:25
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Lord Twisted posted:I don't think at any point our government had said Assad is our friend. I think they've made it pretty clear the only 'help' he's going to receive is the indirect benefits of outside forces fighting ISIS. No need to use hyperbole. Er... The Guardian posted:
Nope, I'm fairly sure that wasn't hyperbole, given that figures within defence/intelligence are openly talking about the need to build a relationship with that mad gassing bastard. It's not like the UK doesn't have a long history of doing pretty much the same thing in other places.
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Aug 26, 2014 09:32
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Similarly the Taliban were awful monsters and now we're negotiating with them as we pull out our troops. That said though it is pretty scary the idea of fanatics with lots of combat experience coming back to Europe. Obviously we shouldn't abandon innocent until proven guilty but some steps have to be taken to detect and stop them before they carry out an attack. It really annoys me that the incompetence of Bush and Blair has bolstered their anti-civil liberties and imperialist agenda. They alienated the Muslim community and hosed up Iraq so badly they created a new breeding ground for hyper extremist Islam. This means more military intervention is necessary and a need for further weakening civil liberties becomes plausible.
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Aug 26, 2014 10:18
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Aaand Boris Johnson has announced that he's going to stand as an MP at the next election. This is it folks, End of Days is just going to be 3 years late. http://news.sky.com/story/1324944/boris-johnson-to-stand-as-mp-in-west-london
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Aug 26, 2014 13:53
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gently caress my life.
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Aug 26, 2014 13:56
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I see him going up against Cameron for leader sometime after the election, regardless of who's in power.
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Aug 26, 2014 14:03
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DesperateDan posted:Er... My point is this still falls short of the Foreign office making overtures towards Assad. These are not Cabinet members or people actually making the decisions, though I completely accept your point. If Cameron declares the UK is going to cooperate with Assad I'd love to see how the papers spin it. It was the anniversary of the gas attack last week and SA's finest Brown Moses did some good stuff on it. Pretty much 100% that it was the government gassing those poor civilians.
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Aug 26, 2014 14:11
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goddamnedtwisto posted:Aaand Boris Johnson has announced that he's going to stand as an MP at the next election. This is it folks, End of Days is just going to be 3 years late. That's not the worst BORRISH FOR KING news this week: he wants a presumption of guilt for suspected Islamic State fighters (read: anyone who goes to the Middle East).
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Aug 26, 2014 14:43
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I doubt that idea will take hold with the rest of the Tories, but if it does, I hope the opposition goes full-on soundbite and bleats about how sacrificing that cornerstone of our British Values™ means that the terrorists have won.
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Aug 26, 2014 14:50
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KKKlean Energy posted:I doubt that idea will take hold with the rest of the Tories, but if it does, I hope the opposition goes full-on soundbite and bleats about how sacrificing that cornerstone of our British Values™ means that the terrorists have won. Labour? They're as much use as a chocolate fireguard; their response to the Islamic State threat is to bring back control orders. Meanwhile, the Lib Dems are pre-occupied with Lord Grabbyhands again. It's a shame the Tories have scrapped compulsory Equality Impact Assessments. I would've loved to see that particular one.
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Aug 26, 2014 15:01
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KKKlean Energy posted:I doubt that idea will take hold with the rest of the Tories, but if it does, I hope the opposition goes full-on soundbite and bleats about how sacrificing that cornerstone of our British Values™ means that the terrorists have won. That'll be the same Labour party that removed the right to silence, introduced ASBOs and all the rest of the OUR SECURITY bullshit would it? e: Which, I appreciate, may well be your point. Pork Pie Hat fucked around with this message at 15:22 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 15:06
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KKKlean Energy posted:I doubt that idea will take hold with the rest of the Tories, but if it does, I hope the opposition goes full-on soundbite and bleats about how sacrificing that cornerstone of our British Values™ means that the terrorists have won. Then the Tories remind people David Miliband exists. Ed can't really denounce his brother's role in extraordinary renditions even if he wanted to (which I strongly doubt) because it'd upset the Blairites too much.
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Aug 26, 2014 15:07
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Lord Twisted posted:My point is this still falls short of the Foreign office making overtures towards Assad. These are not Cabinet members or people actually making the decisions, though I completely accept your point. I don't think it would really happen like that: I doubt we would see any real media attention played to it, there wouldn't be press conferences announcing Assad's return to the fold or glossy photoshoots of Cameron embracing Assad a'la Blair and Gaddafi because there is no need to rehabilitate his image (and as you note, how the gently caress would the media spin it). It would be more like it seems to be now, a few notable names giving reference to having to hold their noses and deal with the slightly less insane murderous despot to "get the job done" so that in a few months or a year when it's revealed that Assad was pointing out ISIS forces he would like struck in direct co-operation with the west, or was opening up air corridors for strike aircraft then there's some cover in the form of "oh well we did say we might have to do that". Of course, with the way things are going it's entirely possible that by the time anything "useful" is actually done, Assad will have about as much sway as the FSA do, Syrian control of airspace in the south is already pretty much non-existent. And yes, unless someone's standards of evidence are at the "well 9/11 was actually done by stealth blackops F16s with laser cannons READ OPERATION NORTHWOODS YOU SHEEP" level, it's pretty clear Assad was responsible- in fact, I have seen less conspiracy guff over the gas attacks than any other large event in recent years, I only know about it through BM getting hassled over it.
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Aug 26, 2014 15:55
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Another horrible "organized child abuse and prostitution" story. Professor Alexis Jay posted:the seriousness of the problem was underplayed by senior managers and was not seen as a priority by South Yorkshire police. Jay said police "regarded many child victims with contempt". drat. e: Yeah, I sure kan markup gud. Arsenic Lupin fucked around with this message at 15:58 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 15:56
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TinTower posted:Labour? They're as much use as a chocolate fireguard; their response to the Islamic State threat is to bring back control orders. 'Because of the weakening of the powers, two terror suspects absconded - one in a black cab, one in a burka' poo poo, now that they've got a motorised burqa it can't be long before they're weaponising them too 
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Aug 26, 2014 15:57
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It was probably a portkey.
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Aug 26, 2014 16:28
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Pork Pie Hat posted:That'll be the same Labour party that removed the right to silence Would you mind elaborating please? I was under the blissfully ignorant position of thinking I still had the right to remain silent. Unfortunately the words are so generic that I'm just turning up links to New Zealand when I google it! Prince John fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 17:31
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I looked up Labour undermining Habeas Corpus to see if they simultaneously undermined the right to remain silence and found this awesome, timecube-esque website: http://www.watchingyou.info/index.p...edom&Itemid=273 quote:The Serious Organised Crime and Police Act is one of the biggest threats the Great British Public has ever faced and we’re facing it here in Bolton right now.
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Aug 26, 2014 17:39
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