TECH NEWS: A.I Depression Detection Moves Forward

Photo used freely from the excellent Gratisography website

As anyone will know, we humans have pesky emotions, those things that add both flavour and heartache to life. We might not always be fully aware of what we are feeling though, and it is in this that artificial intelligence might soon come to our aid.

A professor and student at the University of Alberta's Computer Science Department, Eleni Stroulia and Mashrura Tasnim respectively, have recently released their findings with regards to A.I's depression detecting abilities, and the potential this might have for future applications.

They used data from previous research and, using various machine-learning algorithms, they developed a new way to detect depression in the timbre of a subject's voice. This method might lead to new ways in which our tech can monitor our well-being:

"A realistic scenario is to have people use an app that will collect voice samples as they speak naturally. The app, running on the user’s phone, will recognize and track indicators of mood, such as depression, over time. Much like you have a step counter on your phone, you could have a depression indicator based on your voice as you use the phone." - Eleni Stroulia

As someone who suffers with depression, this kind of news is quite exciting. I don't always catch myself slipping into a bigger 'dip' in mood, and sometimes the realisation only comes once I'm entrenched in cycles of downward thinking. If I had an app on my phone that could pop-up a notification and say "Hey, you are dipping a little!" I might have a chance to get ahead of things and do those self-care things that sometimes help take my thinking down a more cheerful path.

The more I think about it, the more I'm curious as to how A.I might perform in detecting other emotions in our voices. How cool would it be to have a friendly app saying "You're very lonely right now, don't let this affect your standards with your Tinder swipes!" I know that is only a few steps away from HAL and his "I'm afraid I can't do that" attitude, but hey, it's interesting to ponder.

Source: University of Alberta

HORROR NEWS: Wicked Witches Are Coming This August

We live in a time where more and more people are going vegetarian or vegan, but the titular characters in Wicked Witches not only fancy a bit of man-flesh but also the soul it houses inside. That's just greedy if you think about it.

The story follows a man ejected from his house for shagging around. He goes back to the farm of his youth, but all is not well there. For one thing, there is the small matter of his friend being possessed by said group of witches. Thus starts the plot to feast on the unsuspecting playboy.

Watching the trailer brought me to thinking that I haven't seen a decent witch film for a long, long time. There's that other shaky-cam found-footage film that I'm sure you've heard of, but I was pretty underwhelmed by that and its more slick sequel. Wicked Witches looks 'proper bleak and gory' in my opinion, and the whole set-up of the possessed friend working for them adds a bit of extra spice to things.

Wicked Witches will be in select theatres and also available on DVD and VOD from August 9th. It comes from The Pickering Brothers by way of Midnight Releasing, and stars Duncan Casey, Justin Marosa, Samantha Schnitzler, Jasmine Clark and Laura Coleman. Visit the official Wicked Witches website, and checkout the trailer below:

GAMING NEWS: Archaeological Deciphering Game Heaven's Vault Now on GOG.com

I'm always partial to a bit of code deciphering, so when I saw an announcement about Heaven's Vault being available on GOG.com, and that it was a hieroglyphical, archaeological, non-linear narrative adventure game, I wondered how this game had managed to pass me by.

The game follows the story of Aliya as she explores The Nebula, a scattered network of moons. The ruins you explore garner inscriptions that need to be translated. What's more, the translations you choose apparently feedback into the story, and the game never tells you if you are correct or not. This is all wrapped in a lovely art-style and a sweeping soundtrack.

The game comes from inkle, the creators behind the world-roaming adventure game 80 Days, a game that I very much enjoyed, so I know that they have a pedigree when it comes to charming adventure games. Heaven's Vault released on PS4 and Steam three months ago, and I managed to miss it's arrival.

I'm intrigued by Heaven's Vault. I'm a sucker for games with a pleasing art-style, but the way that it sounds like your decisions/decryptions actually have meaning, and that the game doesn't hold your hand, that is something that I wish was a feature of many more games.

Heaven's Vault is on GOG.com at this link, and for a short time is 20% off, making it £15.99 rather than £19.99. You can also watch the trailer below:

HORROR NEWS: 3 From Hell Full Trailer Released

3 From Hell is the third film from Rob Zombie that details the leisure pursuits of the murderous Firefly family, and it has just had its full trailer released.

Seemingly set to take place after their shootout with the police at the end of The Devil's Rejects, the trailer shows the trio beating their massive injuries. Some people despair at this, others create some kind of movement to get them released from prison.

Having a "real day of the dead" is mentioned, seeming to be backed up by a number of Mexican-themed scenes in the trailer. Then come the various scenes of a knife-wielding, mad-giggling, build-up to violence. "This is my death factory, and you are the product!" is just one of a handful of meaty quotes.

I was quite late to the Firefly family party, only catching the first two films (the first was House of 1000 Corpses) on Netflix. I enjoyed their 'Texas Chainsaw' aesthetic, and there is something quite charming about a creepy clown, in my opinion. 3 From Hell looks set to continue the madness, and I think the element of the trio having "fans" while in prison is a nice touch.

3 From Hell stars Sid Haig, Bill Moseley and Sheri Moon Zombie along with a number of others including Danny Trejo, Richard Brake and Jeff Daniel Phillips. It was written and directed by Rob Zombie and the studio involved is Lionsgate.

First screenings will occur in September (in the U.S), and you can find out more by visiting the official site at this link: Robzombie.com/movies/three-from-hell-2019/ . Be sure to check out the trailer below too!

Game Review - American Truck Simulator Washington and Forest Machinery DLCs (PC)

American Truck Simulator has had a couple of new DLCs released recently, and you can read my review of them over on Geek Syndicate at this link.

Dark Fiction - The Carrion Maven

I have a short (very short) piece of fiction now up at Black Hare Press called The Carrion Maven. Click here to read it and here to visit the Dark Moments page where you can read others' work too.

Flash Fiction - Slow

Flash Fiction - Slow

By Casey Douglass

Spinkel had always been slow. Not slow in a dimwitted kind of way, but slow in both movement and speech. His friend Rami often joked that Spinkel lived life at half-speed. Spinkel felt this was an exaggeration, as he knew he would have to do his version of “running” to even approach “half-speed”.

The doctors were stumped as to whether his condition was mental or physical, or both. After years of tests, pumping him with caffeine, stimulants and courses of cognitive behavioural therapy, they did what any caring doctor would do. They washed their hands of him.

As far as Spinkel’s job prospects, they shouldn't have been zero, but they were. He’d achieved good grades at college and shown himself to be a friendly, sociable chap. Employers however, wouldn’t touch him. Job after job passed him by. The Job Centre tried to help. They had the bright idea of having Spinkel re-classified as a robot. It didn’t work. They penalized Spinkel for their own failings. He told them to go fuck themselves. Slowly, of course. With diagrams and everything.

On a darkening evening, Spinkel found himself on the roof of the local multi-story car park. He considered jumping. He idly wondered if he would fall at a slow, ponderous rate. It was as he ruminated on this that he spied a gathering in a back garden on the other side of the street. His heart hit a heady forty five beats per minute as his breath began to catch in his throat. He saw a group of people, and they were slow too!

As it turned out, they were full-speed people, but people behaving in a deliberately slow fashion. After his chat with the leader, he bought a book on Tai-Chi and other meditative movement-based disciplines. He wondered if he’d found his niche in the world. He studied hard and became a teacher, running his classes at the local town hall and amassing such a following that he soon had to expand his operation. He brought his innate slowness to the postures and movements he performed, something even the best ‘normal’ instructors could only dream of. 

Spinkel fell in love with a frazzled woman who’d worked herself into a nervous breakdown. Together, they found that his tempo and her over-drive blended perfectly into the bosom of their intimate relationship. They had two slow children, were adopted by a moderately-paced cat, and lived out their days in a quiet cottage, packing every second of every day with only as much as it could comfortably carry.

THE END