Editing 1444: Cloud

{{comic
| number    = 1444
| date      = November 7, 2014
| title     = Cloud
| image     = cloud.png
| titletext = Cloud computing has a ways to go.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] and [[Megan]] are lying outside on the grass and looking up at the clouds. Cueball asks Megan what she thinks a particular cloud looks like, following the common human activity of {{w|pareidolia}}, or spotting apparent patterns where there are none (particularly in clouds).

Rather than responding with her own interpretation, Megan takes a picture of the cloud with her phone, and uses Google's [http://www.google.com/insidesearch/features/images/searchbyimage.html Search by Image] feature. In this feature, the user uploads an image rather than providing a keyword to search on, and is presented with suggestions about the subject of the original image. Google's search results reveal that the image Megan uploaded is probably an image of a cloud. While indisputable, this does not address the fanciful dimension of Cueball's original question, and highlights the continuing limitations of {{w|artificial intelligence}} with respect to human imagination. (Then again, there is not anything tailored to this on image search.)

Google image search works by creating a mathematical model of the shapes and colors in the uploaded image, and matching this against images already in its index. Web page analysis then allows Google to guess at what the image is, based on the content of the pages where the matching images were found. Although apparently unimaginative, even humorously so,{{Citation needed}} Google image search does recognize that the subject of Megan's photograph is a cloud, which is an achievement that has so far eluded programmers. This was the subject of [[1425: Tasks]].

If the term "cloud computing" is taken entirely literally, and purely in the context of this comic, then the title text merely comments that the processing of an image of a cloud for queries is not at an advanced state yet. It is really, however, a pun on {{w|cloud computing}}, which is a trendy term for the modern tendency of providing massive amounts of digital storage and distributed computing power over the Internet. In this context, the term "cloud" is a metaphor for the way the details of where or how the storage or processing is done are obscured from the user, as if it all takes place inside a cloud. In 2014, cloud computing ''as a commonly accessible service'' really is in its relative infancy, being a 21st-century phenomenon, although the concept goes back decades. {{w|Java (programming language)|Java}} was originally marketed in the 1990s by Sun Microsystems with the slogan "the network is the computer", and the mantra of technologies for distributed computing such as {{w|Common Object Request Broker Architecture|CORBA}}, {{w|Enterprise JavaBeans|EJB}} and {{w|SOAP}} was [http://rtcgroup.com/whitepapers/files/RTI_DataOrientedArchitecture_WhitePaper.pdf "data first" and "the computer is the network".]

In a way, every conceivable sense of the term cloud computing is utilized in Google's image search for Megan's cloud image. Cloud computing is also referenced in [[908: The Cloud]] and [[1117: My Sky]].

It might be interesting to note that the month before, in September 2014, Google employees had published work on image recognition and pattern-enhancing algorithms. Originally conceived to allow better enlargements of small pictures and the objects contained in them, the process could be tweaked to overemphasize weak structures in pictures, leading to {{w|DeepDream}} images, which literally did start to "see" distinct, known structures (mostly dogs) even in random noise. This is rather similar to the pastime of looking for known objects in clouds.

Cueball and Megan are again seen cloudwatching in [[1899: Ears]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan are lying outside on their backs.]
:Cueball: What do you think that cloud looks like?

:[Megan takes a photo of the cloud with her smart phone.]
:Phone: Snap

:[Cueball sits up and looks at Megan. Megan uses her phone. The uploading is written in square brackets in the comic...]
:Google -> Search by image
::[Uploading...]

:[In the last frame she gets a response from Google.]
:Google: Best guess for this image: '''''Cloud'''''
:Cueball: Keep trying, Google.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Google Search]]
[[Category:Photography]]