Google fails at photo tags (...or does it?) - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 09:14:42 am
content: OK, I'm going to tread carefully here as some people might be offended by an otherwise rational comment. I ask that any responses are kept civil as we all know how threads have a tendency to spiral out of control, so let's be adults here.There was an article in the news today (http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/black-friends-furious-after-google-photos-app-tags-them-as-gorillas/story-fnjwmwrh-1227424486999) about the new system Google are apparently using to tag photos. It unfortunately "recognised" and tagged two black people as "Gorillas". Below is the screen grab from the article.Now, some people seem to be "furious" about the whole thing, pointing fingers, saying it's "effed up" etc... but is it? Really? Now for disclosure's sake, I'm a Caucasian male but I have no problems with race. I am not a racist regardless of what anyone else thinks. But I can kind of see how this might have happened from a technological point of view. To me this doesn't seem like a big deal. The system was clearly wrong and they fixed it. I'd say the system works fairly well, it's pretty amazing in fact, albeit some minor tuning may be required.(Reference image of an Eastern Lowland Gorilla attached.)

author: Artlav
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 10:01:49 am
content: It's a fact of life that people are similar to monkeys, pretty much regardless of race.So the problem is that of precision.The algorithm is precise enough to tell a car from a tree, but is not precise enough to distinguish a pickup from an SUV.The more precision you want, the more complexity there is.Technical problem.Another problem is that computers have zero bullshit tolerance.If you look like a monkey, the algorithm would say so, regardless of whether it's polite or not.And this can easily run across a common tabu, like comparing black people to gorillas.You don't do such comparisons, whether they are true or not, whether you joke, mean good or bad. It's impolite.But a computer is like a little kid - it says exactly what it sees, without any intent to (or concept of) offend anyone.People tend to anthropomorphise computers.I.e. a server will say that it now only work through a thin client, and someone will get offended "because it called me fat".Unfortunately, it's too much to ask for people not to take such things personally (and when you live in the constant environment of causal discrimination, it may not even be possible), so the only way is to mark off the minefields (hopefully in advance) and run the roads around them.

author: kolonelkadat
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 11:01:33 am
content: “A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier.”? H.L. MenckenIn any event, the computer threw some darts at a wall and "gorilla" stuck. Just like siri, it just makes a guess (and is demonstrably shitty at it). Id like to point out that the very clearlynotwhite dude on the bike was captioned "bicycles" and not "stolen bike". there's no racial component here.

author: Tandy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 11:17:06 am
content: Bet they don't make it a headline when a picture of some old bloke with a big white beard gets recognised as a Japanese macaque.

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 11:20:40 am
content: Quote from: kolonelkadat on July 02, 2015, 11:01:33 amAgreed! I would hardly call it "news" anymore.Quote from: Tandy on July 02, 2015, 11:17:06 amOr a garden gnome

author: nitro2k01
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 12:38:21 pm
content: This reminds me of when some people were crying racism when it turned out the Kinect had a harder time detecting black people in a dark room compared to white people.

author: GK
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 01:06:24 pm
content: Quote from: Halcyon on July 02, 2015, 09:14:42 amThe article you linked to is concerned exclusively with the complaint of a single individual - namely one of the persons in the "selfie" who wasn't pleased with the fact that the picture featuring himself with a friend was labeled "Gorillas". I don't see any accusations (let alone cries) of racism there and if you are genuinely puzzled over that fact that a black person may be displeased at having their photos tagged such then I think you must be a bit dim. Beyond an obvious embarrassment for Google in the roll-out of yet another overall technically impressive, but ultimately stupid, social-networking app, all I can ask is 'so freaking what?'. So perhaps you can clarify exactly what your point/gripe is supposed to be here, because it isn't clear to me at all.Quote from: Halcyon on July 02, 2015, 09:14:42 amAnd this is actually required because?

author: krish2487
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 01:24:42 pm
content: I ll just say what most of us are thinking (well atleast I am anyway)..It does not help if the people in question are making weird expressions like pouting and duckfaces!!I hate to be blunt but the girl in the pic is making a pout like the gorilla featured below. Couple that with the color and there you have it..Example of darwinism in computers...Forget artificial intelligence.. even actual intelligence(no, human beings dont qualify) might mistake the two..

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 09:13:20 pm
content: Quote from: GK on July 02, 2015, 01:06:24 pmI thought I was being quite clear. The fact that this made newsat allshould be enough. But for your benefit, check the linked Twitter feed to see further examples or any other the numerous news articles out there on the net. People are jumping on the "racism" bandwagon when it is no such thing.So that was my point, to drum up some mature conversation about an issue that I see as being as far from racism as it gets, not because I happen to think Gorillas are cute etc...

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 02, 2015, 10:30:25 pm
content: The picture representing education has a black person wearing a smart cap and gown in it.Of course it's not about race but some people get offended because they're sensitive.

author: GK
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 03, 2015, 09:14:53 am
content: Quote from: Halcyon on July 02, 2015, 09:13:20 pmAll kinds of banal and trivial BS makes the news. Nothing new or unusual there and who seriously gives a toss about Twitter?Quote from: Halcyon on July 02, 2015, 09:13:20 pmLike motions of solidarity for bearded white men that look like garden gnomes? You clearly have a handle on the pressing social issues of our time.Quote from: Halcyon on July 02, 2015, 09:13:20 pmYou do understand why a "colored" person may be miffed at having his or her selfie pictures uploaded to the net labeled "Gorillas", don't you? In that news article that you linked to, that you apparently take issue with, the use of the word "racism" was only applied in reference to that historical context.

author: Mechanical Menace
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 03, 2015, 09:32:04 am
content: STT software has a real problem with my voice. I used to think it was a combination of my slur, stammer, accent and unusually deep voice. But now I know it's not a technical setback, it's the algorithms being prejudice against partially deaf Yorkshiremen

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 03, 2015, 05:49:43 pm
content: The real question is what are the "elements" of the picture used to make the identification. Google will not be talking since they want to protect their proprietary information, but based on my own education and experience in image understanding I strongly doubt that skin color is a dominant algorithmic component, and perhaps not used at all.It would be really interesting to know if this is an artificial intelligence application, with large training sets, back annealing and so on, or some sort of top down image parser that then does some Bayesian comparison to a database. Or some hybrid or other approach.

author: cimmo
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 03, 2015, 06:55:18 pm
content: Quote from: CatalinaWOW on July 03, 2015, 05:49:43 pmWhatever basic algorithm is used, I'm sure Google will be putting in a top layer "Political Correctness" feature to avoid this in future.

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 04, 2015, 02:19:42 am
content: This was making the rounds recently:http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2015/06/inceptionism-going-deeper-into-neural.htmlApparently they're experimenting with some sort of artificial neural net system, and the above link has a number of images that show what a net that has been trained to look for a particular object 'sees' in an image of something else. The images are really quite fascinating.

author: German_EE
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 04, 2015, 07:08:52 am
content: Neuralnets can work very well, PROVIDING they are trained correctly. Back in the late 1980's a UK company called Logica was given the task of producing a system that could spot tanks in woodland. So, they showed it 500 pictures of empty woodland they showed the system 500 pictures of woodland that contained tanks. They then inputed ten new pictures as a test and the system failed every time.Why?The pictures of empty woodland were taken on a sunny day and the pictures of woodland plus tank were taken on a cloudy day. The system had trained itself thinking that tanks only went out on cloudy days and the new pictures were taken during the Summer.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 04, 2015, 10:44:03 am
content: Quote from: ajb on July 04, 2015, 02:19:42 am+1Thanks for sharing, that's awesome