Dan Bishop » Internet

Facebook Chat Now Works With Jabber/XMPP

Dan Bishop — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:38:41 +0000

Yup, facebook chat, notorious for being the world’s worst chat platform (yes even worse than MSN) now allows you to connect using XMPP (the best chat protocol in the world).

All you have to do is set a facebook username, then you can connect using username@chat.facebook.com and your facebook password… it really is that easy!

You can see more details and instructions for specific chat clients here: http://www.facebook.com/sitetour/chat.php

Artificial Intelligence – www.cleverbot.com

Dan Bishop — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 21:24:05 +0000

I remember the first artificially intelligent bot I ever spoke to. It was back in the days of the Amiga and its name was Claude. It could answer very basic questions like “How are you?” but as soon as things got even remotely complicated, it would say something like “Is that the door bell I hear? You’d better get that!”. Evidently, things have moved on in the world of AI. Check out www.cleverbot.com. Here is a conversation I have just had with it:

User: Are you clever?

Cleverbot: Yes i’m clever.

User: Are you hot?

Cleverbot: Hotter than you. Greasy neckbeard.

User: Oh so you want to offend me?

Cleverbot: Yes.

User: That’s not very kind. I thought you were a nice bot…

Cleverbot: I’m very naughty.

User: In a dirty way?

Cleverbot: Speak only spanish from now on.

User: Kann ich bitte auf Deutsch sprechen? Ich spreche kein Spanisch…

Cleverbot: What’s that mean?

User: Please can I speak in German. I don’t speak any Spanish…

Cleverbot: No.

User: Do you speak German?

Cleverbot: A little.

User: Tell me something in German.

Cleverbot: I don’t know how.

User: Liar.

Cleverbot: I do know.

User: I know you do, so please, say something in German.

Cleverbot: Hallo. Wie gehts dir?

… I went on to answer the question in German and it carried on speaking to me in German. I told it I was very impressed (in English) and it switched back to English. Unfortunately, this part of the conversation was lost, it’s logging feature doesn’t work half as well as its AI

Try it, it’s truly amazing!

Animals in Central London!

Dan Bishop — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 23:44:35 +0000

A friend sent me this today http://www.animalsontheunderground.com/the_animals.html One of those internet gems

4OD for Linux has finally arrived!

Dan Bishop — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 06:40:06 +0000

It’s not quite 4OD, it’s 4OD catch-up, but as far as I’m aware the only difference is the inability to watch archived shows, such as old episodes of Green Wing or Black Books… but maybe in time this will become a reality too.

So what has prompted this new service? I’d like to think demand from mac and Linux users, but who knows. The shift from Microsoft’s WMP to Adobe’s flash player has certainly made the whole thing more accessible though. Whilst it would be nice to have a completely FOSS solution, this is unrealistic at present and I think Channel 4 should be applauded for taking steps to make life easier for non-windows users.