> capable of at-least C++ "constexpr"-style compile-time computation, which shouldn't even be possible if one presumes GPT is "just" a giant database storing only multidimensional word similarity scores and sequence distribution from text inference
I don't see how being a giant word-DB necessarily disqualifies compile-time computation. You can view computation as applying a series of term rewrite rules to an input until some sort of termination condition (or indefinite loop). In the case of these AI, the input is the prompt and predicting the next token is a limited form of term rewriting (where the rules are probabilistic and based off the network), and because code and explanations were probably included in the training data, it seems reasonable to me that the "rewrite rules" of Python bled a little bit into the AI.
It makes me insanely curious about the internal structures though. I gave that site 2 similar examples: one produces a correct explanation while another produces an incorrect explanation. The difference: a deleted line of insignificant whitespace
From those 2 examples, I think its pretty clear that the AI's "rewrite rules" don't always coincide with Python's, but I would expect this to be mitigated by targeted training (like Copilot).
> The west fears machines too much for some reason.
I unironically attribute it to the Matrix. The movies have somehow weasled its way into the public discourse as either some sort of prophecy or actual reality (the 'pill' speak, living in a virtual reality, etc.).
I won't comment on the validity of any position, but I think it's pretty cool that a piece of art has proliferated in such a way. I do wonder how impactful it has been in comparison to stuff like the Bible, Tolkien, etc.
Assuming your WASM sandbox is airtight, that would work. But there are still ways to break out or cause damage because within the sandbox, its like a flat address space with 0 modern protections like ASLR, stack canaries, page protection, etc. (unless you manually compile it in yourself). See [0]
Consoles and gaming PCs tend to be expensive (in terms of upfront costs), require more physical space to use, and are hard to move.
Mobile phones have multiple purposes and, crucially, are mobile (shocker, right?)
This means that if you could only have 1 electronic device, you'd 100% choose a mobile phone.
And what better way to find a lot of customers than a F2P mobile game? It has 0 barrier to entry, a large audience, relatively low development costs, and little actual "game design" expectations.
> Only bit I disagree with is that the big spenders are doing it purely because of addiction or gambling.
People spend big in games because:
* The spending is very stimulating visually and audibly (think lootbox openings)
* The gains from their spending translates directly to game-social prestige, game power, or both (i.e. an Advantage)
* This Advantage allows them to lord over the players who have spent less (or 0 in the case for F2P players)
Whether that manifests into addiction depends entirely on the rest of the game's design (but you know, games that introduce the Advantage tend to want to make a lot of money by getting you hooked on spending...)
> Second, games provide a sense of community. A lot of game revenue is monetizing people's desire to not be alone. Calling these players addicted is I think reductive.
Yes, these games do provide a sense of community because they are purposefully designed to do so. Without an incentive to play while getting lorded over by whales, the fish will leave. Without a bunch of fish to lord over, the whales will leave. Again, this depends on the game's design, but the vast majority of them encourage addiction to the Advantage and its use against others.
Maybe you can extend this analysis to IRL stuff. I don't know because I don't participate in any of it.
I think game monetization is over-scrutinized for a couple of reasons.
One, it's fresh - games had a fixed cost for about 25 years. Notice I didn't say it's new, because games had similar monetization tactics if you go back far enough to arcade tokens.
Two, the most vocal players are not yet in the income-earning years of their life which makes them incredibly price sensitive. Once they get older and have a better grasp of time and money, they may decide spending $200/month on a game you enjoy daily from the toilet is on par with other hobbies they could have, and more convenient.
From another angle, consider grocery stores which purposely arrange their stock inefficiently to make you walk deeper into the store. And force you into data collection price clubs by withholding competitive prices. This stuff is just as 'exploitative' as dark patterns, but with only a fraction the digital ink spilled over it. (I'm doing my part!)
> One, it's fresh - games had a fixed cost for about 25 years. Notice I didn't say it's new, because games had similar monetization tactics if you go back far enough to arcade tokens.
Monetization schemes lay on a spectrum, but even arcade tokens lie on the tamer end in comparison to modern schemes. The biggest difference: the only Advantage most arcade tokens would give you is an extra life (i.e. a skilled player can get away with minimal pay). I am aware of 0 arcade games that give you extra speed, damage, or max HP just because you put in another coin while that is INCREDIBLY common with modern monetization schemes.
> Once they get older and have a better grasp of time and money, they may decide spending $200/month on a game you enjoy daily from the toilet is on par with other hobbies they could have, and more convenient.
Sure and I won't argue against continually spending money on games. I think its a really good thing that helps develop content and keeps the game alive (I think $60 for modern AAA games is absolutely ludicrous; it was $60 back in the 90s or 80s and it certainly hasn't kept up with inflation and dev-costs).
> I think game monetization is over-scrutinized for a couple of reasons.
My stance:
* The stuff most people spend money on (i.e. in-app-purchases for lootbox/gambling opportunities) is bad for gaming because they encourage BS game designs that artificially restricts progress and incentivizes psycologically manipulative tactics
* These BS game designs make the games worse (as a "pure" game) 99% of the time
I basically haven't touched a modern AAA game in 5+ years because of this. In terms of gameplay, indie games have been way more interesting and diverse. And I give 0 shits about graphics.
> The spending is very stimulating visually and audibly (think lootbox openings)
This reminds me of an article (which I can't find again) talking about "the toy in the interface". A good game will be fun to simply interact with on a user interface level.
Has anyone built a lootbox simulator yet? Skip the game and just do lootboxes. Give people a way to scratch their lootbox itch for free.
If done well enough, with a good toy in the interface, this could actually draw attention and profits away from those who exploit.
The best lootbox sim I found is the CSGO Case Simulator [1] mostly because it keeps tabs on how much it'd cost to buy the case, buy the key, and how much you'd be able to sell your won item for. Obviously it isn't the exact same as the Valve system of odds, etc, but it's fun to let it auto spin for a while and see just how much you've lost.
> Old-school, driven by craft, not obsessed about clicks and profit.
While this has been the prevailing sentiment for Germany, I wouldn't be so sure after the Volkswagen emission fiasco. At least Volkswagen seems pretty eager to work around QA laws...
Do you also experience mouse input lag? My input is constantly dropped. Test drawing ("free-hand" mode) a line of mining quickly. Are any squares missing?
I get input lag in Windows around 100-150 dwarves. It feels like the GUI not registering clicks, but since the GUI is a separate thread on top of DF it's possible that events are simply lost if a step of the simulation takes a long time. E.g. the selection box will keep running underneath the autosave window or complex world events (migrants, beasts, caravans, season changes), and I think I'd rather have that then random buffered events all playing at once, but certainly GUI integration could be improved a bit.
Using Proton I have mouse input lags when the time is running. So, I pause the game to draw complex things. I hope the Linux version will be reased soon. And I hope they hire somebody to implement multithreading.
I think WASM is filling in that gap to some extent. From the spec:
> Any interaction with the environment, such as I/O, access to resources, or operating system calls, can only be performed by invoking functions provided by the embedder and imported into a WebAssembly module
And IIRC, the core instruction set is reasonably compact.
> capable of at-least C++ "constexpr"-style compile-time computation, which shouldn't even be possible if one presumes GPT is "just" a giant database storing only multidimensional word similarity scores and sequence distribution from text inference
I don't see how being a giant word-DB necessarily disqualifies compile-time computation. You can view computation as applying a series of term rewrite rules to an input until some sort of termination condition (or indefinite loop). In the case of these AI, the input is the prompt and predicting the next token is a limited form of term rewriting (where the rules are probabilistic and based off the network), and because code and explanations were probably included in the training data, it seems reasonable to me that the "rewrite rules" of Python bled a little bit into the AI.
It makes me insanely curious about the internal structures though. I gave that site 2 similar examples: one produces a correct explanation while another produces an incorrect explanation. The difference: a deleted line of insignificant whitespace
* https://whatdoesthiscodedo.com/g/dd2af89
* https://whatdoesthiscodedo.com/g/45ea060
From those 2 examples, I think its pretty clear that the AI's "rewrite rules" don't always coincide with Python's, but I would expect this to be mitigated by targeted training (like Copilot).