The Vesuvius Challenge
The Vesuvius Challenge is a fascinating contest that offers up $1M in prizes for anyone able to read scrolls that were buried in the ashes of a volcano.
Very recently, college student Luke Farritor won the $40,000 First Letters prize with his work using Machine Learning.
Here’s a summary of the challenge/task:
There’s a ton about this project that’s absolutely fascinating. These scrolls exist, but are too fragile to physically handle/unroll. And so the only way to see what the scrolls contain is to find some method of “reading” the scrolls without actually opening and reading them.
As much as I know AI and advances in technology simply go towards more effective marketing campaigns… it’s nice to see actual scientific progress. And the positive ways in which tech can improve our understanding of the world.
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