04 December 2002

Speech recognition analysis suggests Bin Laden tape may be fake Guesswork plays a major role in even the most sophisticated analysis of audio recordings, and U.S. intelligence officials at first advised caution despite widespread claims that the tape aired last month was really of bin Laden. That's especially true since the tape in question was recorded over a phone line, which would have dampened the higher and lower frequencies, robbing analysts of important clues. 6:48:50 PM     comments

Real-time bus San Francisco commuter map shows buses It's pretty cool, but we'd rather get a feed into our mobiles of the content on those electronic indicators at some bus stops in London ("next bus at [busstop] in [mins]"). If it was more of a mobility app, its usefulness would be massively higher. Anyone seen something that provides this? If not, anyone want to start a company to do one? ;) [via vt] 5:16:36 PM     comments

Why it is easier to get a power station built than a bikeshed "This is a metaphor indicating that you need not argue about every little feature just because you know enough to do so." Parkinson explains that this is because an atomic plant is so vast, so expensive and so complicated that people cannot grasp it, and rather than try, they fall back on the assumption that somebody else checked all the details before it got this far. Richard P. Feynmann gives a couple of interesting, and very much to the point, examples relating to Los Alamos in his books. ie when everyone has an opinion, things get messy (the opposite is true: when the project is so complex that no-one feels they can have an opinion, then things can go awry). [via vt] 5:13:51 PM     comments