News You Can't Use: Robot 'Sent Back to Humanoid School'

We're rapidly approaching a technological singularity where robots will be able to type letters that are blurry and have lines through them or participate in the internet without immediately becoming racist against every single people group. The frustration comes in being so close but falling just short, as even promising bots must be returned to "humanoid school" [common core joke goes here] after failing spectacularly in basic interactions with the meat bags they will one day destroy. Hopefully this will prove corrective, because I have a feeling I'll make a great pet.

A robot has been sent back to 'language school' after she forgot where the Great Wall of China is.

The hero types "Who is buried in Grant's tomb?" into the supercomputer, causing it to melt down, throwing off sparks and billowing clouds of smoke.

China's talking robot Jia Jia stumbled over her words during her first live TV interview in English.

We expected it to effectively mock Mercerism, but instead it was a total mess.

The mechanical marvel 'forgot' basic words and phrases in conversation with American journalist Kevin Kelly. 

He's interviewed Obama, he's used to it.

Jia Jia, wearing a wig and long flowing robes, was unable to respond to questions about the number of letters in the English alphabet.

It's going to be a great interview, I'll ask the metal woman about the alphabet and the Great Wall, maybe slip in something about a turtle in a desert if there's time.

And when quizzed about where in China the country's Great Wall was located she paused before stating: "China!"

*checks Google* She's right!

Kelly, an authority on robotics and artificial intelligence, asked Jia Jia if she could talk about him. The robotic reply was unintelligible. 

It sure sounded like "Kill all humans" but my ears were probably wrong, what with just being rapidly dying biological material and all.

Chen Xiaoping, leader of the team, claimed Jia Jia was asked some "challenging" questions and failed to answer some.

Just because the average American would get it wrong doesn't make it "challenging."

Yet observers watching the conversation on a live stream expressed disappointment. "It does not work!" one commented, while another said: "It needs some major revamping." 

The real story should have been "Most Polite and Literate Commentators in History of Internet."

Full Story. 

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.  

  

News You Can't Use: Justin Faker!

Twitter is a miracle of this modern age. You've got celebrities and politicians who apparently think it's facebook, providing endless banal life updates (I drank a soda!) and sometimes destroying themselves with mildly amusing meltdowns that unsuccessfully challenge the prevailing orthodoxy. You've got shills, endlessly pushing their lame goods and services (Not like I'd know about that. In unrelated news The Foolchild Invention, probably the best novel ever written, is currently available at Amazon.com). You've got single issue voters eager to endlessly discuss that special one issue. You've got teens and their extremely important teen problems because that's the most meaningful and valuable time in the human life span by a wide margin. You've got "joke" accounts, with names like Dave Chickensoup and Manda CrimesAgainstHumanda making wacky quips that even mainstream television would reject. And, of course, fakes.

Yes, phonies. It's a tough pill. I assumed that dozens of swimsuit-clad ladies, many in various states of what zoologists calls "presenting," wanted to hear my third-rate stand-up act played out over a series of 140 character posts. The sad, bitter truth is it turns out probably at least some of these bathing beauties are not actual people as we know them. Still, I can take some solace in knowing it also happens to Justin Bieber. Yes, you read that correctly. The horror, the horror...

The Canadian teenager was crowned the King of Twitter earlier this year when he overtook Lady Gaga's follower count. But it would appear the award was bogus as the study reveals Gaga has in fact got more real followers. Justin, 19, leads the top ten Twitter accounts for fake fans with around 45 per cent of his following believed to be completely phony.

Noooooo!!!!! Now who will rule over us? Next you'll be telling me that so-called "fake fans" are also having an impact on, say, presidential elections. I refuse to Bieleib it. 

I'll spend a few hundred bucks, get a fake army and then conquer the world. Am I doing it right?

Fake followers are determined as those who follow less than 50 and have less than one follower, have never tweeted or use Twitter to promote spam and use words including 'diet', 'make money' and 'work from home'.

At least this is logical. No real person, at least in America, has any interest in working or dieting. #DevastatingTruths 

But the Twitter news is the latest blow for Justin who has endured a tough few months. He was dumped by girlfriend Selena Gomez at the start of the year and was booed on a recent trip to London after arriving two hours late on stage.

You're not Axl Rose, kid. Try to be more punctual in the future. This write-up will go into your HR file, along with a formal reprimand for having fake followers. 

 Original article which is ironically riddled with annoying ads for useless garbage.

Aaron Zehner has many real twitter followers, all of whom are extremely intelligent and attractive. His first novel The Foolchild Invention is available in e-book format at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.