Can a Computer Identify Your Urban Tribe? 117
Zothecula writes "Whether it's fashion, a favorite football team, or a certain kind of music, humans seem to enjoy being considered part of a larger group, and often self-identify as such. With this in mind, students from the University of California, San Diego Jacobs school of Engineering are currently developing a computer algorithm that can deduce from an image whether you're a goth, surfer, hipster, or biker."
Your Personalized Result Here: (Score:3, Funny)
Urban Tribe: Neckbeard
Tribe of slashdot (Score:2)
I shudder to think of what this tribe would look like, and how it would be characterized.
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Alas, the Slashdot tribe, whatever its merits or faults might once have been, no longer survives as an independent tribe. Through a complex intriguing, its once-leader, Cmdr. Robert "Taco" Malda, committed treachery and sold the tribe into slavery. After changing hands at several slave markets through a series of owners dissatisfied with their purchase, the entire tribe is now, believe it or not, owned by a pair of dice.
Pair of dice? (Score:3)
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Stalker, geeker, tweaker, gangbanger, bible thumper, petitioner, voter, and dentist?
Pollster, telemarketer, fraudster, newscaster.
And frog.
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Urban Tribe: Terrorist. All of you.
Love and Kisses,
The NSA
This just in (Score:5, Funny)
I sent the tribe an e-mail stating, "Please accept my resignation. I don't want to belong to any tribe that will accept people like me as a member".
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She wants me to tell you that "wan'ts" isn't a word.
But...you've just used it in a sentence! How clever of you...
Re:This just in (Score:4, Funny)
Your English teacher called. She wants me to tell you that "wan'ts" isn't a word.
Why a four-year-old child could understand that post. Run out and find me a four-year-old child. I can't make head or tail out of it.
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How he got in your pyjamas, you'll never know...
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Communication with the Dead, I would place you as Goth.
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Allright, you got me on that one. But would the people who are members of the group that likes Groucho Marx quotes accept membership of that group?
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Quite True,
I want to be different so I will go Goth, I will dress up and act like all the other people who act Goth.
Hipsters, yea those guys are just trying to fit in, it is just hip to seem like you are not trying to follow a style.
Bikers would be next on that list... However a lot of their dress is functional, leather isn't just stylish because it looks tough, but it will save you skin if you fall of the bike.
Surfers, mostly functional ware. When they are not surfing they can look different.
Formal is alm
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Bikers you mean bikers who ride bikes or people who want to buy in to the Hd myth lifestyle. Or a merkins who just want an excuse to wear crotchless leather chaps?
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Cosplayers might break your Pseudocode. Lots of dark clothing and non-standard hair colors as well as face make-up / lighter skin tones.
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Cosplayers aren't real people though. They are characters.
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Cosplayers are real people portraying characters. Their tribe is that of "cosplayers".
Original character cosplay (Score:2)
Oh, goodie. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Oh, goodie. (Score:5, Funny)
Is the world of Minority Report just around the corner?
We knew you were going to say that.
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God damn it, I had zounds of mod points until yesterday, and when I finally read a very funny entry... they're gone.
Yes, yes, you knew I was gonna say that :)
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Who cares. I don't care whether it adds millions to his bank account or gives an alien a heart attack.
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Who cares. I don't care whether it adds millions to his bank account or gives an alien a heart attack.
And now you know why they invade us in all the movies. Every time you mod funny, you give an alien a heart attack
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Should I do it more often, then?
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God damn it, I had zounds of mod points until yesterday, and when I finally read a very funny entry... they're gone.
...
I wanna see the "posts from the mysterious future"-predicting algorithm they use around here to give you lots of mod points but never when you're really going to want them.
How can they possibly know ahead of time?
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No, the next step is they will predict what your face looks like by just looking at your social data.
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Don't you mean what products you are likely to pay double for?
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It's not that hard (Score:2)
The subculture weirdoes dress in a certain common way exactly to be easily identifiable. It's about as subtle as holding a blinking "I'm a goth." sign over their head. So while I think that the software is impressive, I wouldn't worry about the privacy implications much, it's only able to profile extroverts who want to be noticed.
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Many of us are disturbed by the idea of automated facial recognition being coupled with all the video surveillance that's becoming more and more prevalent in public places, to track us wherever we go, and that's bad enough. Now you're telling us that they're taking it to the next level and developing automated video profiling software? Is the world of Minority Report just around the corner?
People "pigeon hole" other people on first glance, and have since the cave dwelling days.
This is just doing it by computer, and should come as no surprise to anyone, (even though it will probably be patented by tomorrow morning).
100% success rate so far (Score:2, Funny)
Right now, it's correctly indentified every one of the students who sat down in front of it as "overweight nerd"
Don't they know, everyone is unique? (Score:3)
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I too await our overlords to assign me to a group. Then I can finally know what it is I'm supposed to act like.
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we can ascertain your tribe by getting a response to a few questions (cause it's fun to "pigeon-hole" and label people) , but you have to answer these questions about yourself and your two closet friends who are not Significant Others:
1. Age
2. Biological Gender and then Gender you Self-Identify
3. Number of and Sexual Orientation of Your Sexual Partners in Last Five Years.
4. Children? and are some of them living with you?
5. Four Favorite Activities or Hobbies
6. Occupation and Income
7. Two Personal Heros
8. T
Re:Never understood this (Score:5, Insightful)
Defending something for which you have no part in its success is silly to me. Whether it be sports or being a Windows fanboy, I just don't get it. The blind patriotism some people have is also baffling. Being a groupie and making arguments on behalf of people/companies/teams as if their actions somehow reflect on you as a person is delusional, sorry.
Even this perspective makes you part of an "urban tribe", the "non-conformity conformists".
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Maybe they should come up with a uniform, like beatniks. Berets and sunglasses, Man.
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Re:Never understood this (Score:5, Funny)
Brian: Look, you've got it all wrong! You don't NEED to follow ME, You don't NEED to follow ANYBODY! You've got to think for your selves! You're ALL individuals!
The Crowd: Yes! We're all individuals!
Brian: You're all different!
The Crowd: Yes, we ARE all different!
Man in crowd: I'm not...
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Defending something for which you have no part in its success is silly to me. Whether it be sports or being a Windows fanboy, I just don't get it. The blind patriotism some people have is also baffling
(A) The people most likely to do that are the ones who have the least personal accomplishments so they outsource their pride to whatever groups they can manage to identify with. It is a sign of deep insecurity.
(B) This NYT article has nothing to do with that. It is about identifying where you grew up or otherwise lived for a long period of your life based on your word and pronunciation choices.
I AM E !! (Score:1)
I am E) a gothic surfer hippie hell's angel wannabe !! Now all I need to do is wear black, learn to surf, where a flower on my scalp, and kill some motherfucker !!
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Wouldn't that just make you EMO?
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Emo would try suicide, and fail, and whine about it
Don't understand my result (Score:4, Funny)
Urban Tribe? (Score:2, Funny)
Someone has too much time on their hands.
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I suspect that if run against my picture, I'd be classified as either Biker or Hipster (although I'm neither). The algorithm probably fails against anyone who doesn't live in an urban environment, so I guess the results would be inaccurate anyway.
Why is so much effort placed on classifying a person. You belong to X group, or Y group or Z group - what if I don't like or associate with any of those groups? What if my long beard has nothing to do with motorcycles? I suppose it's marketing related - but I'm
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Indeed, that is why I posted the Groucho Marx quote above.
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I would suspect the effort to associate might be more along the lines of identifying gang members, likely drug users/pushers , terrorists, or ghe ability to target adds.
I suspect it will be used to avoid breaches of peace before it will be used to sell things. Governments and the surveilance state has more ability to take advantage of it currently and most police opperations activly look for tech that allows them to not think as much so cheaper less inteligent people can fill positions without second guessi
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Why is so much effort placed on classifying a person.
Its easier to conquer and/or control a divided people than a united one.
I tried it (Score:3, Funny)
None of the above (Score:3)
whether you're a goth, surfer, hipster, or biker
As often happens, I was placed in "none of the above" when social classification came around.
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As often happens, I was placed in "none of the above" when social classification came around.
Ah yes, the Picked-Last-For-Kickball-Team non-tribe. We know of it.
I'm part of a tribe (Score:1)
Must be a bad picture (Score:2)
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Then perhaps you're a Hyrulean? [wikipedia.org]
NIl Sociological Value, IMHO (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems to me that the only application for this sort of this is attempting to attract venture capital to create a "business" that can be sold to Facebook/Google/Yahoo/whatever to aid in their quest to give marketers even more information which they think might help them sell more stuff.
While this is unsurprising, it's also pathetic. Sigh.
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Worthless (Score:2)
Several options (Score:4, Interesting)
I would consider myself a member of at least five different tribes. While there is overlap between these tribes the overlap is nowhere near complete. For example I am a crafter and a gamer. While there are many gamers who are also crafters there are at least as many who are not.
not it can't (Score:1)
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Welcome to the tribe of loner, where everyone thinks that they're unique and that everyone else is the same.
I have a surprise for you: you are probably less unique than you think and other people are more diverse than you think (even when they are a part of a group).
In all likelihood, algorithms such as the one mentioned in the article can bin you just like it can bin anyone else. In all likelihood, the bin will accurately profile you within statistical uncertainties. Chances are that those statistical un
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There are no degrees of unique, so one cannot be more or less so than someone or something else.
You either is or you ain't.
But that doesn't mean that two unique things or persons cannot be almost exactly the same.
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I don't belong to one, plain and simple, i am self inflicted loner.
You and a whole bunch of other people.
Many don't adhere to the dress code (Score:5, Insightful)
I love goth and industrial music, have been to hundreds of concerts, met and was friends with many band members. But I look decidedly regular. I'm looking back at my old photos, and I see one of a standard geeky guy with regular hair and glasses, wearing an admittedly hideous blue windbreaker, partying with Nik Fiend.
So this algorithm shouldn't only associate your face with your culture, but use the faces of those around you to establish your culture. But then I have friends who are in a death metal/industrial band, and their mainstream family members come to concerts to show support. So we'd have regular people labeled as being in the death metal culture if we did that.
This is Perfect! US "Journalists" will love this. (Score:2)
Future US TV Journalists will not have to risk error or waste their time stereotyping the people in their reports! They can spend their important time investigating celebrities!
Police cameras can profile people without bias so they know who to abuse and who not to abuse! No more frivolous lawsuits over police prejudice!
All 4 Tribes Discovered! (Score:1)
Wait a minute. (Score:4, Funny)
Those aren't the Urban Tribes I learned in history class. Aren't they supposed to be Collina, Esquilina, Palatina and Suburana? [wikipedia.org]
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the Romans thought the goths were funny, at first.
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making a computer crudely approximate what humans do to each other all the time with their brains?
it won't change anything.
what about metal goths? (Score:1)
or biker surfers
or goth surfers
all four of which would be "tribes" I've hung out with over the years.
at one point in the 80's and 90's if you had to pin me down to a "tribe" then "biker goth" would be about as good (and not a particularly good "good") and you could narrow it down to.
Now I just belong to that tribe called "boring old farts who love to tell the youth how much more authentic we were back in our day"
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Sure, I could see biker goths. Makes perfect sense. And well, yeah, kinda been there done that.
I could see biker surfers, I suppose, but wouldn't transporting the gear be difficult?
But goth surfers? Such a thing exists?
I'm not quite a boring old fart yet, or at least I'd like to think I'm not.
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as for biker surfers transporting boards.... they have a whole customising sub culture that solves that problem the most famous of which revolves around Deus ex Machina's shops in Sydney, Bali, LA and now I believe Milan (I think that last one's more a "fashion
Negative, I am a Meat Popsickle (Score:2)
As a cyberneticist, who grew up playing Shadowrun instead of D&D, [wikipedia.org] I'm perfectly fine with being defined as a member of the non-human tribe. [cvdazzle.com]
blast from the past (Score:2)
Reminds me of the interiew snippet in A Hard Day's Night.
reporter: Are you a Mod or a Rocker?
Beatle(Ringo IIRC): I'm a Mocker.
So much for tribes.
Me? I'll go w/ Zoot Suit, with side vents, 5 inches wide!