Google Maps' Athletic Directions (click to englarge)
Posted on 04/13/2007 12:14:52 PM PDT by forty_years
When I asked Google Maps to "Get directions" from New York to London, step #23 advised me to "Swim across the Atlantic Ocean 3,462 mi," get out of the water on the shores of northern France, drive 200 miles up the coast, and then cross the Channel to the UK. The map even shows me at which pier in NYC I should jump off to start my epic Leif Ericsson quest.
Does Google Maps' geo algorithm have a slight bug, or has some programmer hidden a virtual Easter egg in the company's code? The world of complex software applications is an interesting reality, artistic as much as scientific, sometimes dangerous, but also good for decent chuckle. [Continues below image...]
In 1950, Professor Alan Turing, one of the fathers of computing, devised a benchmark to determine a device's ability to demonstrate intelligence. The Turing Test, as it is now commonly known, proposed that if a human believes a machine possesses intelligence, then the machine is in fact intelligent, or more specifically:
...a human judge engages in a natural language conversation with two other parties, one a human and the other a machine; if the judge cannot reliably tell which is which, then the machine is said to pass the test. It is assumed that both the human and the machine try to appear human. In order to keep the test setting simple and universal (to explicitly test the linguistic capability of the machine instead of its ability to render words into audio), the conversation is usually limited to a text-only channel such as a teletype machine...
An early experiment with artificial intelligence took Matthew's (26:41) "The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak," and fed it into a program for translation from English to Russian and back to English. The output: "The vodka is good, but the steak is lousy." Google Maps' code, probably algorithmic, and not heuristic, for directions from New York to London resulting in, "Swim across the Atlantic Ocean 3,462 mi," may not be as classic as "The vodka is good," but it's up there with the best of them.
http://netwmd.com/blog/2007/04/13/1561
An early experiment with artificial intelligence took Matthew's (26:41) "The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak," and fed it into a program for translation from English to Russian and back to English. The output: "The vodka is good, but the steak is lousy."
Of course its a joke—and one after my own heart.
Actually any directions to London involve you doing this.
Los Angeles to London.
30. Swim across the Atlantic Ocean 3,462 mi
It will do it for any European City from the USA
I tested it by putting in my daily bus trip to and from work. The results had me going "as the crow flies" through neighbor's backyards, private complexes, business properties and dead ends. Right now, I walk one block south to catch a bus north 3 miles. The Google version had me hiking over a mile just because it insisted I head north to catch a bus.
Apparently the owners of Google not only know technical matters, but understand marketing as well.
How much free publicity does Google get everytime some columnist writes about one of their stunts? You can’t buy good press like that!
Pretty good instructions one might say as you see the humor in the question.
I checked Google Earth as well. It gives the same instructions. Too funny!
I thought it was weird that you had to drive from NYC to Boston, then swim to France, to end up ultimately in London.
Here are the directions from Detroit to Berlin.
Of course it’s a deliberate joke.
How else are they supposed to deal with direction requests like “give me driving directions from New York to London” - and deal with absurd requests in a way that makes the user smile instead of get ticked off or embarassed?
Best joke I’ve heard all day.
Google’s April Fool’s day link to their “beta version of the toilet ISP” was funny. It took me a few minutes to figure out if they’d been hacked or if it was a “joke”...then I realized it was April 1st.
http://www.wireless-weblog.com/50226711/googles_toilet_isp.php
How about “take a flight from JFK to Heathrow Airport?”
A buddy at work sent this to me yesterday. Too bad driving directions to other popular destinations don’t include swim time.
I tried SFO to Honolulu no luck. I tried LA to Catalina Island. Nothing. Oh well, still good for a laugh.
Obviously an error in the program. It would be much easier to drive to Canada, and then swim to Ireland.
In Google Earth Pro you are routed up through Boston and directed to jump off the Long Warf and swim 3462 miles.
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