Bad beat/Moaning/Venting thread - It's the end of the world as we know it

[Theresa]

First part of the hackathon was tonight. 6pm - 9:30pm - with the sole purpose of the evening being to form teams. Oh it was excruciating. You could either pitch an idea, by putting a purple postit on the board with the idea, or join an idea by putting a yellow postit with your name underneath.

I went with some education idea. Prof uploads documents. App generates questions for students to check their learning. Students can answer in free-form, and app evaluates their answers and offers advice. Sell it as an add-on to uni teaching platforms.

The silence was deafening. And I'd be chatting away to people (itself excruciating) but glancing at the board and seeing no yellow stickers going under my idea.

Then I was chatting to someone and go - I was actually originally thinking about something stupid. Just get all car manuals and people can use voice to ask questions when they want to understand something in their car (e.g. my throwaway post earlier).

The guy goes - 'Bob' get over here. Suddenly we've this guy - whose name I can't remember, and 'Bob' whose name I can't remember. And.theyre.on.the.team. We have a team. We picked up another person. And someone who can't be there tomorrow says she'll zoom in.

So we have:
- A UI designer
- A systems designer
- A data scientist
- A UX expert on call as needs be
- and whatever I am

We're turning up tomorrow at 9am and will code through to 9pm. Then five hours finalizing the prototype app on Sunday, and then we pitch it.

Good god it's both fantastic and awful.

You're going to be the only one coding it seems. Lots of dead weight for a hackathon in that team.

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

You're going to be the only one coding it seems. Lots of dead weight for a hackathon in that team.

I've never had a team before. My main excitement is about having a team! The UX guy does Figma design, which I gather from a conversation tonight should be grand for prototyping. Systems guy has previously developed a question and answer system using GPT. So it might be grand.

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

Calibre seems quite strong. There's a Meta and Intercomm person among them. So it won't be lads wondering what's a computer. Except me perhaps

[Opr]

I was looking through the list of stuff in a similar Hackathon yesterday that someone posted on Twitter. The non-technical winner came up with a solution to your slides problem earlier.

They called it DocuTok

[dinekes]

It takes all the army and the navy

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

I was looking through the list of stuff in a similar Hackathon yesterday that someone posted on Twitter. The non-technical winner came up with a solution to your slides problem earlier.

They called it DocuTok

Oh that's cool

[Solksjaer!]

It takes all the army and the navy

He's got an arm like a leg

[Raoul Duke III]

We go again. The planned evening of restraint did not happen.

Sat beside the Toulon ultras. Some crew.

ALLEZ LES BLEUS!!!!

[Pat Mustard]

La Rochele +9 11/10 B365

[Lazare]

Hitch, that's a pretty fantastic idea tbh.

Could extend it way beyond cars too. Household appliances come to mind. There are tons of features on my ovens and induction hob that I keep meaning to figure out. Asking a chat assistant would be really helpful.

In for 3%

[Lazare]

Next gen IoT appliances will have it built in.

Ask your washing machine advice on not shrinking your jocks.

[Lazare]

Have it reply to you in your Ma's voice.

[Strewelpeter]

That was some try, perfect start.

[Strewelpeter]

Unreal, over bar the shouting after ten minutes.

[Pat Mustard]

Unreal, over bar the shouting after ten minutes.

BBV curse alive and well I see

[Strewelpeter]

BBV curse alive and well I see

Thought I'd used it all up last night

[balfejohn]

Leinster love the bottle job
O Gara has them well marshalled

[Lao Lao]

ComradeCollie TG4 May 24th, 9:30 - Reds na heireann is being broadcast.

[ComradeCollie]

ComradeCollie TG4 May 24th, 9:30 - Reds na heireann is being broadcast.

Ah sure I'm a right wing bigot now, though might give it a look anyhoo

[shrapnel]

That was awesome.

[shrapnel]

All the bets came through, evem first tryscorer. Weekend paid for

[Raoul Duke III]

That was awesome.

Really was. Borh sets of fans super loud but Leinster's heads melted in the second half.

Although I see we can blame sp for BBVing us.

[Solksjaer!]

Why were Leinster going for a try and not a drop goal ?

[MysteryGuest]

LOL Leinster - but sure a grand day out on the heinos anyway for the fans
delighted- genuinely delighted- yet another Irish rugby hype train dismantled- good omen for the autumn

[Raoul Duke III]

Why were Leinster going for a try and not a drop goal ?

Said 51,000 people in the stands.

Heads just gone, no leadership.

But just oversized lads chasing odd shaped balls at the end of the day, no harm done. Waiting on a DART back to the Nortsoide\detox facility. Great atmosphere all weekend, fans from all over Europe. Worth experiencing.

[MysteryGuest]

Sexton on a bit of bother for being a graceless scumbag sore loser too- day keeps getting better
pocket pisser involved too
some of it at half time - lol probably played into the loss

[MysteryGuest]

Incoming bent boxing decision - she was thumped

[MysteryGuest]

Imagine losing a home final in a comp that is everything to you as the league you play is an irrelevant joke against a club for whom it is a secondary comp and who are busting their balls weekly in their real comp and the fucking losers are rammed down our throats constantly as the cream Of Irish sport

[LuckyLloyd]

Incoming bent boxing decision - she was thumped

jaysus you’re on a roll here

Taylor put in a dogged effort against a great opponent in a higher weight class. No complaints on a majority decision but she wasn’t “thumped”. Few things to change for the rematch.

[MysteryGuest]

jaysus you’re on a roll here

Taylor put in a dogged effort against a great opponent in a higher weight class. No complaints on a majority decision but she wasn’t “thumped”. Few things to change for the rematch.

Ok will grant you that- tbf I don’t have anything against Taylor but would have been a farce if she’d got a draw or better all the same and boxing has form - including with Taylor herself
Leinster losing is hilarious though

[Solksjaer!]

I'd say the French version of Misery Guest is slitting his wrists tonight.

[ComradeCollie]

Tim Dillon on the Windsor parasites https://youtu.be/2r_OYsQM55Q?t=231

[Goodluck2me]

We don't do them anymore Paul but I can hook you up with a guy. Can be electric or manually operated with a crank handle. I have the latter and it's fantastic. Really handy for barbecuing on a rainy day.

Can you send me the details too?

also does anyone know a good place to buy orderbook patio tiles, and would they fit them? Got a quote there and it was obscene

[Goodluck2me]

Said 51,000 people in the stands.

Heads just gone, no leadership.

But just oversized lads chasing odd shaped balls at the end of the day, no harm done. Waiting on a DART back to the Nortsoide\detox facility. Great atmosphere all weekend, fans from all over Europe. Worth experiencing.

Especially after Munster showed them what to do the week before. The push for tries works well most of the time but a bit of 3-point game management badly missing. Byrne to blame I think.

[Denny Crane]

Music King Semi Finals are up:

https://www.irishpokerboards.com/for...g-semi-final-1
https://www.irishpokerboards.com/for...g-semi-final-2

Final day of voting

[Wombatman]

Mad what the immigration issue did to politics in the US, UK and across Europe. It's never been a massive factor in Irish politics but it's going to be and sadly it's going to get ugly.

[BennyHiFi]

Final day of buying of voting

Will deffo be in to vote on this later. Sorry been a hectic week so haven't had time for much else.

[balfejohn]

Can you send me the details too?

also does anyone know a good place to buy orderbook patio tiles, and would they fit them? Got a quote there and it was obscene

Give me a a shout
i can pass on a fitter to u as well

[BennyHiFi]

Anyone got any insight into this... (can't read the full story obvs. not paying the Indo anything for anything)

Gardaí search home of bookie group chief in competition probe

Oh... actually I'm sure gambling Twitter will fix me in later!

Not on there so much these days either since the Musk shambles.

[ComradeCollie]

Anyone got any insight into this... (can't read the full story obvs. not paying the Indo anything for anything)

Gardaí search home of bookie group chief in competition probe

Oh... actually I'm sure gambling Twitter will fix me in later!

Not on there so much these days either since the Musk shambles.

SPOILER

The Meath home of the chairwoman of the Irish Bookmakers Association (IBA) was searched last month by officers from Ireland’s competition watchdog and from the Garda National Economic Crime Bureau, as part of a criminal investigation.

The IBA represents 730 of 765 bookmakers in Ireland, including global chains such as Paddy Power and Ladbrokes. Last week the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) began a High Court application to determine if any documents seized from the IBA are legally privileged.

Paul Comerford, an authorised officer of the CCPC, has submitted an affidavit to the court outlining how he is part of an ongoing criminal investigation into suspected breaches of competition law.

He said the search at the Kilcock, Co Meath home of Sharon Byrne, chairwoman and spokesman for the IBA, related to a suspected breach of Section 4 of the Competition Act 2002. That provision prohibits agreements and decisions between associations, and “concerted practices” that aim to prevent, restrict or distort competition.

The Act says this can be achieved through a series of methods, including price fixing, limiting technical development or investment, and sharing markets or sources of supply.

Comerford said the search of Byrne’s house in Kilcock — the registered address of the IBA — was carried out at 8am on April 20 following a search warrant issued by District Court Judge Miriam Walsh in Trim on April 13.

The information he swore at the District Court to obtain the warrant contains information that is “privileged” and “highly sensitive”, and its disclosure would prejudice the ongoing criminal investigation, he said.

Comerford said he showed Byrne the search warrant on the morning it was executed.

He said the seized items include hard copy and soft copy documents and a laptop. Byrne signed the five pages of exhibit charts.

After the raid, the CCPC received correspondence from Eversheds Sutherland, solicitors for Byrne and the IBA, claiming some of the seized material was privileged.

Byrne is claiming the seized items included personal and legally privileged information, while some of the documents relate to other businesses. Both Byrne and the IBA are claiming privilege over all the records until they had time to review them.

Comerford said all the seized material is in secure storage at the CCPC’s Dublin HQ and will only be accessed by agreement with the IBA and Byrne, or by order of the court.

The CCPC is proposing that any contested documents be identified, so they can be reviewed by an independent lawyer who can then evaluate the privilege claims before a final ruling is made by a judge.

In a statement, the IBA said it “operates in accordance with all legal and regulatory requirements, and we will fully cooperate with the CCPC on this matter.”

Their statement continues: "Our association remains deeply committed to safeguarding the best interests of consumers who enjoy having a bet, while protecting individuals who may be susceptible to problem gambling."

The CCPC said the High Court action was taken to determine if documents obtained as part of an investigation are legally privileged, or if they can be disclosed to investigators.

“This is a procedural matter related to a criminal investigation under our competition law powers,” said the CCPC.

Financial filings show the IBA had turnover of €1.27m in 2021, up from €341,000 in 2020. It paid €70,000 to Sharon Byrne, its one employee. It also declared small related transactions with PP Construction Kilcock Ltd and Shaby Communications Ltd, two companies of which Byrne is a co-director with Paul Pender, her husband.

PP Construction Kilcock — which has retained profits of €500,000 — works with bookmakers such as Boyle Sports and Ladbrokes to build retail spaces. There is no suggestion that Paul Pender or his companies are under investigation.

Flutter, the parent company of Paddy Power, confirmed it had 251 shops in the IBA. It referred questions back to the IBA.

.

[Raoul Duke III]

Mad what the immigration issue did to politics in the US, UK and across Europe. It's never been a massive factor in Irish politics but it's going to be and sadly it's going to get ugly.

Given our own immigration story, that would be truly sad.

[Strewelpeter]

Given our own immigration story, that would be truly sad.

Shinners are struggling to hold the line.
Official position is admirable considering they are the extreme nationalist political wing of a military campaign whose sole tactic was ethnic cleansing.
It's one thing to listen to Mary Lou and the leadership but get into any conversation with the Wheelie Bins and their apparatchiks and you will hear a very different tone.

Ireland is full of Shinners activists biting lumps out of their ttheir. It's a long way until the election.

[Pat Mustard]

Shinners are struggling to hold the line.
Official position is admirable considering they are the extreme nationalist political wing of a military campaign whose sole tactic was ethnic cleansing.
It's one thing to listen to Mary Lou and the leadership but get into any conversation with the Wheelie Bins and their apparatchiks and you will hear a very different tone.

Ireland is full of Shinners activists biting lumps out of their ttheir. It's a long way until the election.

Can you please explain bolded bit? Maybe its just me but don't have a clue what it's meant to mean..

[Solksjaer!]

Can you please explain bolded bit? Maybe its just me but don't have a clue what it's meant to mean..

Selective historical amnesia is strong with the SP types .

The sad history of Irish emigration is a result of next to ZERO electoral Opportunities

The only desire for genetic cleansing/ genocide where by the British in Ireland , India . It's coming home to roost and the poor middle English dumbwits waving at their new king are sinking in the mire. Their Spawn still lurk

Millions died from a potato blight - yeah right. Ethnic cleansing right there -? what an insult to these people . No comparison.

[hotspur]

Shinners are struggling to hold the line.
Official position is admirable considering they are the extreme nationalist political wing of a military campaign whose sole tactic was ethnic cleansing.

It's so easy to attack the Shinners in so many ways, why resort to factually incorrect interpretations of the IRA campaign?

[balfejohn]

Shinners are struggling to hold the line.
Official position is admirable considering they are the extreme nationalist political wing of a military campaign whose sole tactic was ethnic cleansing.
It's one thing to listen to Mary Lou and the leadership but get into any conversation with the Wheelie Bins and their apparatchiks and you will hear a very different tone.

Ireland is full of Shinners activists biting lumps out of their ttheir. It's a long way until the election.

Lol

u would be a good pusher of a wheelie bin

[Strewelpeter]

It's so easy to attack the Shinners in so many ways, why resort to factually incorrect interpretations of the IRA campaign?

You're right, the only real military goal was to provide cover for the drug and protection rackets

[ComradeCollie]

Shinners are struggling to hold the line.
Official position is admirable considering they are the extreme nationalist political wing of a military campaign whose sole tactic was ethnic cleansing.
It's one thing to listen to Mary Lou and the leadership but get into any conversation with the Wheelie Bins and their apparatchiks and you will hear a very different tone.

Ireland is full of Shinners activists biting lumps out of their ttheir. It's a long way until the election.

Drunk, or big fingers on a small screen?

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

Not sure I've ever been at anything quite as stressful as that hackathon this weekend. We managed to battle through to a whopping third prize (from 12 to 14 teams) and can now glory in our minor-denomination gift voucher and sweat-stained t-shirts.

The original idea I'd mentioned here was around car manuals. We significantly pivoted from this both on the Saturday and today, each causing us setbacks but also leading to some decent outcomes.

The end product was 'DeviceMaestro' - definitely a name to be ditched and a better name imagined.

The product in its basic form: all your household appliances stored on an app, and any problems with them solved. We use OpenAI embeddings to store all the manuals for each, so whenever something goes wrong, or you want to do something new - e.g. find out what the non-plus30seconds button on the microwave actually do - then the app has all the info waiting there for you. Its a decent basic idea, I think. For example, the washing machine manual we used as one illustration was a few hundred pages long. wtf is going on with washing machines and what glorious advantages are we not taking advantage of?

Anyway that was our core demonstration. This was due to pivoting away from car manuals on the grounds of fairly obvious legal liability if something went wrong and the risk of life-or-death misleading information.

Then today we set about feature expansion.

Our first thought, which we implemented - was an 'upgrade' feature. The app knows all your devices, it knows all your historic issues with those devices - so: click a button to receive a recommendation for a better device. This uses a websearch facility on langchain. All you need to enter is e.g. 'microwave' and the model then draws on all its collected intelligence about your existing microwave to come up with a better recommendation, including availability in your area. I demonstrated this live in the final pitch today and thought it worked very well. The response listed a new microwave and exactly why it was better.

Then there was the 'could-have-been' ideas. We were ridiculously close to demonstrating an ability to talk to the app with voice and receive a voice answer. Literally minutes away, but there was a bug with one of the packages leading to a manic attempt to completely undo two hours of code-work in five minutes. I've genuinely not sure I've ever felt so stressed. A few other ideas we were close to completing, but couldn't get finished were YouTube parsing of device-review videos and how-to-use-this-device videos. The idea here being to seed these into responses as extra information on top of what is in the instruction manual with a link to the relevant YouTube video. We had worked out the parsing, but couldn't implement. There was also loads of work done on an 'energy-optimise my device' tab - using device manuals and broader information to help you optimise things like your fridge. Loads of other ideas that we discussed but couldn't get in - storing and managing communication around device warranties etc.

Although one person on the team, who couldn't make it Saturday as she was away, came in today and did the work of two people over three days doing up this fucking brilliant Figma app mimic video showing the future features. So we got some credit for the planned future features.

The key downfall was the Saturday. We became obsessed with working out how to retrieve images from manuals. On the grounds that these would be really nice in the responses to questions. Most of the day - 12 hours - spent on that by three of us, and we just couldn't work it out. It turns out to be something that's just not yet possible. I came home that evening quite dejected and the wife - well used to keeping tech projects moving along - goes, but sure that's not even the key point of the idea - Ditch it and move on. I brought that philosophy into the day today. We came up with ten things we were going to do with a strict rule that if we weren't making massive progress on any individual idea within 30 minutes of starting it, we had to either dump it or get the informal agreement of the rest of the group that it was vital to continue.

That helped knock off loads of delays. Oh if only we had done that on the Saturday.

My personal failing was with one of the guys - a really smart data scientist, Indian guy, recent graduate. He would often get into staring at a screen working on code with no real purpose. Today then, I asked him if he would work on a few specific ideas, and listed them out. And it turns out that was what he was waiting for all along - literally, somebody to tell him what to do. He ended up contributing brilliantly. Lesson learned really there, as yesterday I was treating everyone as 'we're all in this together', but I should have realised that given his age and lack of work experience, he would actually want to be given some friendly guidance on what to do and needed some structure.

We live, we learn.

Thought it was quite interesting how many ideas presented were actually good. Like really good. tbh I'd rated five or six of them ahead of ours, but you can't argue with results. My main man, Kev, who we went through this every moment and could indeed now be friends4eva was saying that when he used to go to hackathons before covid that it was rare enough that you'd see truly innovative ideas, as just so many variations of the same tech ideas already existed. But it seemed like the capacity of GPT has opened up this whole new field of really cool possibilities that we just haven't seen before. Indeed, our group of four are now bounding ahead with two separate ideas.


tl'dr - definitely go to a hackathon if you ever have a chance, its a truly fascinating process.

[hotspur]

I really enjoyed the Hackathon stories over the weekend. You were missed recently.

[Raoul Duke III]

My personal failing was with one of the guys - a really smart data scientist, Indian guy, recent graduate. He would often get into staring at a screen working on code with no real purpose. Today then, I asked him if he would work on a few specific ideas, and listed them out. And it turns out that was what he was waiting for all along - literally, somebody to tell him what to do. He ended up contributing brilliantly. Lesson learned really there, as yesterday I was treating everyone as 'we're all in this together', but I should have realised that given his age and lack of work experience, he would actually want to be given some friendly guidance on what to do and needed some structure.

We live, we learn.
.

That is very much a cultural thing.

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

Hitch, that's a pretty fantastic idea tbh.

Could extend it way beyond cars too. Household appliances come to mind. There are tons of features on my ovens and induction hob that I keep meaning to figure out. Asking a chat assistant would be really helpful.

In for 3%

jaysus - I do not see this! ha. brilliant.

[Lazare]

jaysus - I do not see this! ha. brilliant.

I'll get my people to talk to your people.

[Lazare]

The bit you mentioned about the technology opening up so much in terms of possibilities, does that then make monetising ideas more difficult?

[zuutroy]

I got that fancy Bora hob and I just press the power button and the '7' button, like I've done with all previous induction hobs. Heat the thing - don't heat the thing. That's all you need from a hob surely?
Same with the washing machine. The dial has about 20 options...'daily wash' is the only one I'd ever dare choose.

[Lazare]

I got that fancy Bora hob and I just press the power button and the '7' button, like I've done with all previous induction hobs. Heat the thing - don't heat the thing. That's all you need from a hob surely?
Same with the washing machine. The dial has about 20 options...'daily wash' is the only one I'd ever dare choose.

Mine (hob) has a feature that heats entirely one full side of it with slightly different temps, you move the pot around on it I think or something. Have never used it as I haven't really delved into exactly why I would use it.

I could RTFM but I think I'll wait and buy Hitch's app

[Raoul Duke III]

Mine (hob) has a feature that heats entirely one full side of it with slightly different temps, you move the pot around on it I think or something. Have never used it as I haven't really delved into exactly why I would use it.

I could RTFM but I think I'll wait and buy Hitch's app

We have a pretty much new kitchen where not one page of one manual has ever been read.

Same goes for the new BBQ beast that I picked up the other week. That's actually the only one I would care about mastering.

What would the revenue model be Hitch?

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

The bit you mentioned about the technology opening up so much in terms of possibilities, does that then make monetising ideas more difficult?

I suspect we are in a gold-rush period, similar to the beginning of the internet, where first-mover is everything. Like amazon having the idea to sell books online at the commercial beginning of the internet. Obv that's now a fairly basic idea, but they got all these advantages just from being first to do it. There must be a billion ideas out there that all have some sort of chance right now. While maybe in a years time, there might be just a few tens of thousands of ideas.

[Hitchhiker's Guide To...]

We have a pretty much new kitchen where not one page of one manual has ever been read.

Same goes for the new BBQ beast that I picked up the other week. That's actually the only one I would care about mastering.

What would the revenue model be Hitch?

It's a bit of a difficult one. You'd actually end up losing money is the first few months of user acquisition as the retrieval process is quite expensive. Ideally you'd make it as cheap as possible - e.g. €20 a year - and then hope that the likes of Harvey Norman, PC World think its worth buying?

[zuutroy]

We have a pretty much new kitchen where not one page of one manual has ever been read.

Same goes for the new BBQ beast that I picked up the other week. That's actually the only one I would care about mastering.

What would the revenue model be Hitch?

Do you ever go out to Higgins for your meat? He really is playing a different game to every other butcher.