Auctioning some geeky stuff

[sylvar]

I'm selling Seasons 1-5 of The Simpsons and the first book ever written by a computer (The Policeman's Beard Is Half-Constructed, Racter, 1984) on eBay.

Wish me luck and/or put in a bid! (I'm guessing that papertygre and bethlynn will want the AI-written book, or know someone who would.)

Comments

[poppinjaye.livejournal.com]

I work for the one of the creators of BRUTUS, over here.

http://www.scienceblog.com/community/older/1998/C/199802590.html

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

Oooh. This page looks particularly computer-generated. :)

[poppinjaye.livejournal.com]

That's an old site--there is no ppcs dept anymore. Not since way before I started here. Now it's just Cognitive Science.

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

Oh, and by the way, tell your employer about my auction, eh?

[poppinjaye.livejournal.com]

I'd be surprised if he didn't have it...but ok :)

[bethlynn.livejournal.com]

bid has been placed

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

woo woo!

curious

[papertygre.livejournal.com]

Is the Racter book interesting? What's it about?

Re: curious

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

It's poetry and prose generated by a text-generating program; there have been allegations that the human involved tampered with the output. Many of the prose bits are isomorphic to each other; a fair imitation would be "Mary considers John but John does not contemplate Mary. Cabbages resplendently ponder Mary. Many philologists dance terribly with the cabbages."