U.S. Secret Service Requests Software to "Detect Sarcasm" on Twitter

[Makabriel]

I'm proud that my government is finding a way to do what even normal people can't do on the internet. *applauds and salutes*

 

[Alpha Maeko]

The SS wants to detect sarcasm.

"Oh, GOOD FOR YOUUUUU!" *axe* *axe* *axe!*

 

[NotThePANTSU]

It's surprising how many people have difficulty even with the most obvious sarcasm.

I've found it's much faster and simpler to just explicitly mark anything I say that isn't serious since I'm one hell of a sarky beggar and being less sarcastic has proven too difficult for me; so, to that end, I've got into the habit of using an exclamation point, within brackets, to denote sarcasm as this is the way it is rendered in the subtitling of UK television.

I'm pretty sure I read awhile ago that some group somewhere (yes, my memory is terrible) had already created a program that analysed thousands of tweets and/or forum posts to 'learn' sarcasm and then detect it but there was a slight problem in that the accuracy wasn't exactly stupendous (50~70% correct detection iirc).

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

Well unfortunately for the secret service, every time we try to build a sarcasm detector it explodes because of there being too much sarcasm detected.

*sigh*
Remember when the Secret Service tried to be secret about spying on it's citizens. (let's face it, they always have been doing it anyway)

dammit i wanted to post that

i guess ill settle for this one


personally this is one of the dumbest ideas ive heard, detecting sarcasm outside of the internet requires taking into account a plendora of variables, such as context, tone, social norms, and your existing knowledge of the person you are talking to

detecting sarcasm on the internet is even harder because things like tone and knowledge of the sarcastic person, usually dont exist

in conclusion, good jod US Secret Service, you bunch of damn geniuses

 

[Flames66]

I am mostly against this because it is unwanted monitoring, but it is not privacy invasion. Anything posted to Twitter is publicly available so they are not breaching anything by reading it.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

Given how good American human beings are at detecting sarcasm, I have my reservations about how well an American computer program can.

Either you are being sarcastic, or you actually think Americans are worse at detecting it than everyone else, which isn't true.

I'm not saying they're worse at detecting sarcasm than everyone else. I'm saying they're worse at detecting sarcasm than British people.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

Now they just have to integrate this into Google glass and they can fix Sheldonism.

 

[Buzz Killington_v1legacy]

But seriously, how would they do it? Do they secretly have mind-reading devices or something?

There's actually some pretty serious science going on for this sort of thing, usually under the heading of "sentiment detection" or "sentiment analysis". Most projects use machine learning techniques like naive Bayes or support vector machine classifiers. The details of that sort of thing are way too long and esoteric to get into here, but basically they take a dataset of known sarcastic text, show it to the algorithm they're using and tell it "These are sarcasm", then let the algorithm infer what features make the text sarcastic. There's a Dutch group [http://repository.ubn.ru.nl//handle/2066/112949] that got a 75% success rate at identifying sarcastic text on Twitter, so there's definitely something to it.

 

[Grabehn]

IF this were to be a thing, I'd love for some sites to give a prompt to people answering comments, something along the lines of "this is sarcasm, you dumbass".

 

[heroicbob]

"sarcasm doesn't work in print" because, simplistically, when we write we hear the words in our mind as if they were being spoken and thus with the "inflection"/"delivery"...but the "inflection"/"delivery" (that would normally socially flag something as being deliberately "sarcastic in tone") is not conveyed through the written words onto the page.

so...they're planning to read our minds ?...

when i read this article i was thinking of the league of legends guy who got sent to prison last year for saying something on facebook i absolutely thought from the tone it was sarcastic but i guess that doesn't always come across

 

[FPLOON]

There is a punctuation mark used for sarcasm, it's called the Irony punctuation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_punctuation). Now if people would just use it, that'd be perfect.

Holy shit, son! I didn't know that shit existed! Shit! I keep learning something new on the internet every single day![footnote]How the hell do you even translate that "Irony Punctuation" into context?! Oh wait... Found it[!][/footnote]!

OT: Yeah... Good luck with that...

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I... Seriously? Of all the goddamn inane things, fucking sarcasm detector? Will someone tell the current administration Hollywood is fake, its all special effects wizardry... and that the Simpsons are cartoons, as in not reality.

 

[Shinsei-J]

There is a punctuation mark used for sarcasm, it's called the Irony punctuation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_punctuation). Now if people would just use it, that'd be perfect.

What, that's amazing!
I've always been annoyed that there was no punctuation for sarcasm but there actually is.
It's something that needs to be taught in schools, I have no idea why it isn't already.
Fuck, I'm just so happy about finding this out, irrationally so.

 

[Kuro Serpentina]

Its actually possible to detect sarcasm with a machine?
Might be interesting, if it wasn't for THEIR hands

 

[Vegosiux]

I both agree and disagree with "relaying sarcasm via punctuation/font formatting". On the one hand, it makes it a lot more likely it doesn't sail past the other party.

On the other hand...that's not how sarcasm works! You don't go "I'm going to be sarcastic now" and say something sarcastic, that completely kills the effect >.>

 

[vagabondwillsmile]

I can't help but think of a certain episode of Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends during which everyone tries to teach Blue about sarcasm.

 

[Caiphus]

Awesome.
After this, they can get working on a machine that detects irony.

And then we have a safe use for all those unmanned drones. They can fly around playing this whenever their sensors pick something up:

Spoiler

 

[LongAndShort]

How the fuck is this supposed to work? Do these people even know what they're asking for? Nice to see America's tax dollars are so well spent.

 

[chadachada123]

There is a punctuation mark used for sarcasm, it's called the Irony punctuation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_punctuation). Now if people would just use it, that'd be perfect.

But what's preventing someone from using the punctuation itself sarcastically?

It seems like succcchhh a useful symbol.

(Heh)