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119 Comments
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+20This is a wonderful idea, but those images look like TV static. How are we to notice a 10x4 pixel white thing in an image that's full of white noise?
- gklitt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+14This is a very interesting implementation of Amazon's Mechanical Turk and it shows how powerful big groups of people can be. Unfortunately I really think it's going to be hard to find a 6 pixel boat in those pictures. The example shows a boat leaving a wake behind but I don't think a lost sailboat would be as visible.
- dalangalma, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15Larger explanation and direct link to the task here: http://www.allthingsdistributed.com/2007/02/help_find_jim_gray.html
- dcpar, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14Jim was one of the fathers of the SQL language and the relational database. Everything we do on the internet nowadays, right down to reading Digg, bears his fingerprints. His work has had (and will hopefully continue to have) a significant impact on the world.
Losing this guy would really be a tragedy. - halosniper7, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14i hate clouds
- cracell, on 10/12/2007, -3/+15Satellites have issues with clouds. And we are looking for a definite object. Where-as the clouds and foam(?) have indefinite shapes.
If it was my family member out there and there was a .01% chance that volunteers searching through imagery would help find them. I'd appreciate everyones help, besides what else are you going to do tonight? Play some pointless video game? - eric1, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11I agree; I wanted to give it a try, but it's almost ridiculous :(
- mrfreeziexp, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Jim Gray and his family, you are in my thoughts and prayers.
- Ireland, on 10/12/2007, -12/+20This better not be a repeat of the James Kim situation, cause that really tore me up, even if I never knew him :(
- D3koy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Anyone else find it ironic that a man who worked with imaging services and Google maps is missing and to find him you have to look at crappy pictures?
This is a real tragedy, and like all tragedies I deal with it through jokes made in poor taste - mwturnage, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7While I'm certain they were too big for Gray's boat, I spotted at least two objects in about fifty photos that were almost certainly ships/boats of some sort (very bright, well defined rectangles in nearly featureless backgrounds).
- mediaphile, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7It's not that I think it's a waste of time in principle, it's that the images are of such low quality and full of so much noise that it's nearly impossible to tell if there's anything in them.
- jeff303, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7It's very difficult to make out anything in these photos. On my 1680x1050 screen I can barely see 4 pixels of anything (let alone distinguish a "boat" from some random wave caps), unless I use an image-zoom extension which seems like a bad idea since it could distort the data. Their sample of the red rectange is not that helpful - we know the size but not the appearance. Will his boat be making a wake like the sample? I'm too reluctant to mark anything as "Nothing of interest" because I'm afraid I will have missed something.
I would help if I felt more confident in my choices but as it is now it's too difficult to say for sure; I wish the instructions were MUCH more explicit and the photos much higher resolution. I would definitely donate CPU cycles to do photo analysis though! - jggr, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9@ nauzilus
It's called human decency... And also, in case you've just got your first computer, the internet is a wonderful place. And Google can find damn near anything. It is possible that someone in his family will see the above post in a random search. And then they'll see yours... (Well, hopefully not, I'm gonna bury you). Which do you think the family would like to see? His post, or yours?
Be part of the solution, not part of the problem. - Dundasbro, on 10/12/2007, -5/+11Please, humour is something that makes tragedy somewhat more bearable
- angrycat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6They rarely venture outdoors, and without google maps they get lost easily.
- Wisgary, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I agree, I would sit here for an hour and wouldn't really even mind, would be glad to help, but I'm really reluctant to mark anything as nothing of interest because I wouldn't want to mark something inaccurately and make people miss something of true interest.
- Matt2k, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I think maybe they're showing multiple people the same image with varying levels of contrast, which is why some of them look like a normal grey-scale image of the ocean waters, while others look like sharp black & white TV static, while others look like marshmallow soup. I even got the same image 3 times in a row. Not sure what was up with that. I assume if statistically enough people "spot" something in a high contrast image, that it raises a flag somewhere and they can investigate themselves with various imaging techniques. I mean, I'm just guessing here, but that's probably how I'd go about doing it.
This was done by smart people, and while I'm not sure that anyone will find him, I'm sure they're going about it in the best way they can. - jggr, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9*sigh* Why do I bother?
OK bud, here's the point. While I agree with you at some level...The above post was a useless post... But yours was even more so. And just saying 'hope you're OK Jim" doesn't make you part of the solution. The solution I was talking about wasn't the missing person, it was the solution of making a world a better place. And you ragging on some dude on the Internet for giving best wishes to a grieving family just doesn't help.
"But ***** tards who post "my wishes are with you" just for the sake of feeling good about themselves are starting to ***** me." This really sums up the level of maturity and thoughtlessness you have for your fellow citizens of the world. Who cares if it makes them feel better? It doesn't hurt anyone (well, with the exception of those heartless ***** like yourself), and it adds a little more positive energy to the world. While all you do is generate negative energy. That is why you're part of the problem.
Ahh ***** it, I'm really tired, and don't really care. I'm off to bed.
Just one more point... If you can't say anything nice, keep your ***** mouth shut. :-)
Peace. - silverbolt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Went through a couple dozen, but over 5,000 to go. What Amazon Turk really needs is a tag surrounding the text and radio button to make it easier to select yes or no.
- jrandyw, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I went through 25 HITs. Yeah, its really hard to make out anything that small. I did come across a set of images that had what looked like a fading wake from a large ship. I don't know, maybe we can help somehow. If I were the family, I'd hope people would help, even if it seemed hopeless.
- psylence, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Seriously. Especially considering GPS's protect you from large waves, equipment failures, human error, the works! GPS's make every trip absolutely foolproof and safe.
Stupid geniuses. - Jammerdelray, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4How bad are those photos, I mean come on.....If your going to be serious about finding him then those images have got to be more concise. Assume the worse that he had a heart attack, got knocked overboard etc. then it would take some time for the ship to be pulled in near any land masses for you to find any debris. I guess we will know alot more in a week or two. Hoping for the best outcome.
Hate to go through this again...James Kim's death was horrible news. - psycx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3From yesterday's WinInfo Short Takes by Paul Thurrott: "Search Called Off for Missing Microsoft Researcher: On a serious note, it's with much sadness that I must report that Microsoft Researcher Jim Gray, an amazing and inspirational man who did much to turn SQL Server into a serious enterprise product, is missing and presumed dead. An experienced sailor, Gray was on a solo sailing trip near San Francisco when he disappeared. Days of searching have proven to be fruitless, unfortunately. Gray was one of the good guys, and my heart goes out to his family, friends, and coworkers. Everyone he met was touched in a very positive way."
- kutza, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Don't know about Jim Gray, but I found Waldo!
- ckedge, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3What they really need in circumstances like this are two planes flying at 10,000 feet with a six stabilized 10 megapixel cameras zoomed in to the 3 mile wide swath beneath the plane - sending the photos to a laptop that's got a gps logging the coords. The planes fly at say 300mph for 8 hours, and we've got detailed 15cm resolution color photos of 14,000 square miles of ocean. THEN 100,000 people on the internet look over the photos.
I wonder how long until someone puts that together and has it on standby for searches? I wonder if it will finally occur to the coast guard of some nation - or if it will take the relatives of a dead guy to get motivated and put it together.
Don't laugh, remember rich techie who rented a copter and took detailed photos of the entire coastline of California and put it all on the net? - recockulous, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I could not create a "Turk" account for some reason.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -18/+21A big waste of time. You won't even be able to find Mobey Dick in those images.
- cracell, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Awesome! This got on the front page. This is an awesome use of mTurk and satellite technology. Now I'm off to go through 3,000 of these HITs!
- SyDIGG, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Whats up with computer guys getting lost. Do they lose all sense of direction after a life time staring at the computer monitor?
- anastrophe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3you have 'accept hit' before you can start using it.
- oldmanpants, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3ENHANCE!
- nauzilus, on 10/12/2007, -5/+8@stephbu
If they're turning to geeks on the Internet looking at fairly ***** random images, I think they're in a bit of trouble. That trouble is probably exponential for Jim Gray.
Now, you had better be sitting there clicking image after image trying to find this guy or you're simply a hypocrite. Criticizing someone for presuming the tactic is useless with out hitting it hard yourself. And if you aren't, why not? Got better things to do? Like what, work... provide for your family? This guy may be fighting for his life your ***** selfish prick! Get on there!
Otherwise... http://digg.com/tech_news/Search_for_Jim_Gray#c5065494 - dhughes, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2 There no point of reference in the photos, if you had a line that showed one inch equals a mile that would help.
Showing pictures of Jim isn't much help either, show a picture of his boat, preferably from above or maybe show a similar boat on a similar map in the same scale.
The sat photos, as presented, are useless. - petermcneely, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3It really is worth looking at a few. Why not? If that was someone you knew personally, I bet you would be digging through those as fast as you could. Some are actually very clear and it would be no problem spotting a large boat in them.
- gimpbully, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The original images are amazing. I've been grabbing data all day for these guys and setting up mirrors for them. One of the datasets has an average 1.2G image size, they are nothing like the amazon ones (those are post-processed). Given that, the amazon images are quite adequate. I get the feeling you'll know if you see something. And if you're suspicious, that's what the whole setup is for. You submit an image as possibly containing a foreign object and the professionals at the other end get the coordinates to search on the super hi-res images.
- noreturn, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4con·cise (kən-sīs')
adj.
Expressing much in few words; clear and succinct.
I don't think you used that word correctly. - nauzilus, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4@jggr
"Just one more point... If you can't say anything nice, keep your ***** mouth shut. :-)"
Case of do as I say, not what I do huh? I love that you ended your post that way, it's more or less how I felt about your whole post ;)
@MikeZila
Wow, you block someone for making a post you don't agree with? The few people I've blocked are people who seem to be spammers, not those that post opinions that differ from mine... oh well, I guess you'll never know... - tommorris, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Osmanthus: you need to sign up. Login with your Amazon account and accept the HIT (Human Intelligence Task), then you can start working through the images.
- ggko, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Unfortunately I really think it's going to be hard to find a 6 pixel boat in those pictures."
http://www.googlesightseeing.com/2006/11/28/top-10-naked-people-on-google-earth/
If people can determine these 6-pixel blobs to be naked people, they can spot a boat. - Travisx2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I just looked at a couple dozen pages. The Res is really too low to spot anything with any noise in it, ie clouds/waves.
They really need to get their hands on some higher res images. - nauzilus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Just print the damn thing already!
- ggko, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I don't think the point is to actually find the boat (not that it wouldn't hurt,) but to sift out all the unlikely areas of the ocean. You're not being assigned areas unique to you, hundreds of others are also staring at them. And if enough people flag that particular area, the experts can take a closer look. Hence the buttons are:
Yes, this image contains foreign objects that should be looked at more closely.
No, this image contains nothing of interest.
and not:
I found the boat!
No boat. - Osmanthus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I've tried the pages with opera firefox and IE but the controls do nothing....
- ggko, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I imagine a lot of people are looking at the same sections you are, plus there are probably a bunch of asshats marking images at random.
The organizers are likely checking to see which areas got flagged more. So even if you actually missed something of interest, dozens of others didn't. - jggr, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I agree... Without some sort of zoom or image enhancing software (none of which I have available at my work station), this is a hopeless job. And with only 5 pics, you'd think someone would be able to analyze them quicker and easier than waiting for the Internet community to solve it for them.
However, like someone said above me.... In situations like this, you take what help you can. Even if it is slim and hopeless... Lord knows, if I was lost at see, I'd appreciate you fine folks helping out in anyway you could. - ggko, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Showing pictures of Jim isn't much help either"
It puts a human face to the effort. Instead of "look for a 40 pixel box," it becomes "look for a 40 pixel box which might contain *this guy*." - chaosmachine, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1http://s3.amazonaws.com/JimGray/HITs:07FEB01192323-P2AS_R11C08-005598915030_01_P001/07FEB01192323-P2AS_R11C08-005598915030_01_P001-6300-5400.jpg
slightly off center to the right. who knows.. - tommorris, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I've submitted about 15-20 pages. Saw a few things in there, but I expect it's just pareidolia at work. Still, I hope that technology like Mechanical Turk is used to allow the public to help sift through data to help investigations and people search just as distributed computing allows people to contribute spare CPU cycles to crunching scientific data.
- nauzilus, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3@dcpar
A real tragedy? As opposed to a fake or lesser tragedy of your or my mother dying?
@cranium
Not funny. Even if you're a cold hearted *****. -
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