WWTBAM Bored

stolen from the NYTIMES (humor? section):

The Pope will visit President Bush in the White House. Talk about different leaders. One speaks almost no English and thinks he’s God’s emissary. The other is the head of the Catholic Church.

ne1410s wrote:stolen from the NYTIMES (humor? section):

The Pope will visit President Bush in the White House. Talk about different leaders. One speaks almost no English and thinks he’s God’s emissary. The other is the head of the Catholic Church.

I'm not planning on visiting Washington D.C. today. You must be mistaken...

I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

peacock2121 wrote:I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

LOL! Was that a captioning typo? I sometimes wonder what deaf people who depend on that think is going on. There are some really funny mis-typings that occur.

gsabc wrote:

peacock2121 wrote:I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

LOL! Was that a captioning typo? I sometimes wonder what deaf people who depend on that think is going on. There are some really funny mis-typings that occur.

Exactly!

They do sound almost alike.

peacock2121 wrote:I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976, let me explain how that happens:

The system uses a Stenotype connected to a computer which generates the characters on the screen. The Stenotypist uses a phonetic shorthand system. The computer is supposed to use some context-sensitive assistance when generating the English from the shorthand, but that fails often. The Stenotypist has the option of spelling words and is supposed to be looking at the output on the screen and make corrections if necessary.

I would have expected the opposite to have happened: That PayPal would have been displayed as papal. Someone must have made a previous entry in the translation table.

Bob Juch wrote:

peacock2121 wrote:I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976, let me explain how that happens:

The system uses a Stenotype connected to a computer which generates the characters on the screen. The Stenotypist uses a phonetic shorthand system. The computer is supposed to use some context-sensitive assistance when generating the English from the shorthand, but that fails often. The Stenotypist has the option of spelling words and is supposed to be looking at the output on the screen and make corrections if necessary.

I would have expected the opposite to have happened: That PayPal would have been displayed as papal. Someone must have made a previous entry in the translation table.

That cracked me up.

Bob Juch wrote: Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976....

This surprises me. I had assumed that closed captioning was invented by Al Gore, like all the other cool stuff.

silvercamaro wrote:

Bob Juch wrote: Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976....

This surprises me. I had assumed that closed captioning was invented by Al Gore, like all the other cool stuff.

I assumed the same thing.

Bob Juch wrote:Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976,

Where were you working when you did that?

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976,

Where were you working when you did that?

and Cal hits one out of the park!

peacock2121 wrote:

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976,

Where were you working when you did that?

and Cal hits one out of the park!

Not necessarily. He could (A) be telling the truth and have the right answer because of that; (B) know the right answer even if he isn't telling the truth; or (C) Google to learn the right answer.

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

peacock2121 wrote:

TheCalvinator24 wrote: Where were you working when you did that?

and Cal hits one out of the park!

Not necessarily. He could (A) be telling the truth and have the right answer because of that; (B) know the right answer even if he isn't telling the truth; or (C) Google to learn the right answer.

Or he could Google, and discover that he has the wrong year.

Appa23 wrote:

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

peacock2121 wrote: and Cal hits one out of the park!

Not necessarily. He could (A) be telling the truth and have the right answer because of that; (B) know the right answer even if he isn't telling the truth; or (C) Google to learn the right answer.

Or he could Google, and discover that he has the wrong year.

Well, there is that. From what I found, it appears that closed-captioning technology started around 1974, but didn't come into use until 1976 (or possibly 1975). But, that was for recorded shows, not live.

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976,

Where were you working when you did that?

I was working for the U.S. Postal Service. I developed the system on my own however. I gave it to KQED, the San Francisco PBS station. Previous to that they only did closed captioning for recorded shows.

This whole thing cracks me up.

Bob Juch wrote:

peacock2121 wrote:I was walking by a TV yesterday that was on mute. I looked at the words on it and thought:

"Why are they talking about PayPal, I wonder what happened."

The system uses a Stenotype connected to a computer which generates the characters on the screen. The Stenotypist uses a phonetic shorthand system. The computer is supposed to use some context-sensitive assistance when generating the English from the shorthand, but that fails often. The Stenotypist has the option of spelling words and is supposed to be looking at the output on the screen and make corrections if necessary.

I knew the live captioning uses a stenographic system. You'd think their context would be better than it is at this stage, but we still get errors with such common news items like names of local and national politicians and even standard weather terms. There usually isn't enough time to go back and make the corrections in a news broadcast. I have seen corrections in some of the slower sports, like golf and parts of baseball.

Bob Juch wrote:

TheCalvinator24 wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:Since I invented live closed captioning in 1976,

Where were you working when you did that?

I was working for the U.S. Postal Service. I developed the system on my own however. I gave it to KQED, the San Francisco PBS station. Previous to that they only did closed captioning for recorded shows.

Yeah...sure you did.

gsabc wrote: I knew the live captioning uses a stenographic system. You'd think their context would be better than it is at this stage, but we still get errors with such common news items like names of local and national politicians and even standard weather terms. There usually isn't enough time to go back and make the corrections in a news broadcast. I have seen corrections in some of the slower sports, like golf and parts of baseball.

One of the great things about being infallible is that you do not need time to go back and make corrections. Because you never need to make corrections.

Have faith in me on this.

wintergreen48 wrote:

gsabc wrote: I knew the live captioning uses a stenographic system. You'd think their context would be better than it is at this stage, but we still get errors with such common news items like names of local and national politicians and even standard weather terms. There usually isn't enough time to go back and make the corrections in a news broadcast. I have seen corrections in some of the slower sports, like golf and parts of baseball.

One of the great things about being infallible is that you do not need time to go back and make corrections. Because you never need to make corrections.

Have faith in me on this.

You mean the Vatican DOES take PayPal?