Flickr is facing a user revolt after a new auto-tagging system labelled images of black people with tags such as \u201cape\u201d and \u201canimal\u201d as well as tagging pictures of concentration camps with \u201csport\u201d or \u201cjungle gym\u201d.<\/p>\n
The system, which was introduced in early May, uses what Flickr describes as \u201cadvanced image recognition technology\u201d to automatically categorise photos into a number of broad groups.<\/p>\n
For instance, a picture of a newspaper cartoon can be automatically given the tags \u201cdrawing\u201d, \u201csketch\u201d, \u201ccartoon\u201d, \u201ctext\u201d, and \u201cwriting\u201d, in addition to whatever else the uploader decides to add to the photo. Other tags the system can automatically append include \u201coutdoors\u201d and \u201cblackandwhite\u201d \u2013 referring to the picture\u2019s setting and image type.<\/p>\n
But the system appears to be misfiring frequently, and often in offensive ways. A portrait taken by Corey Deshon of a black man named William has been auto- tagged with \u201cblackandwhite\u201d and \u201cmonochrome\u201d \u2013 but also with the words \u201canimal\u201d and \u201cape\u201d.<\/p>\n
The system itself doesn\u2019t appear to be applying race as a factor, since at least one other photo, of a white woman, was also given the \u201canimal\u201d and \u201cape\u201d tags.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere, photos of Dachau concentration camp have been auto-tagged with the \u201cjungle gym\u201d, \u201csport\u201d and \u201ctrellis\u201d tags, while an instantly recognisable photo of the entrance to Auschwitz was given the \u201csport\u201d tag.<\/p>\n
A Flickr spokesperson said: \u201cWe are aware of issues with inaccurate auto-tags on Flickr and are working on a fix. While we are very proud of this advanced image-recognition technology, we\u2019re the first to admit there will be mistakes and we are constantly working to improve the experience. If you delete an incorrect tag, our algorithm learns from that mistake and will perform better in the future. The tagging process is completely automated \u2013 no human will ever view your photos to tag them\u201d.<\/p>\n
The company is already reacting in a piecemeal manner to the mistags, removing the \u201csport\u201d tag from many concentration camp photos, and apparently removing \u201cape\u201d from the auto-tagging software\u2019s lexicon entirely (neither of the photos which were tagged \u201cape\u201d are tagged as such any more, though both still have the \u201canimal\u201d tag).<\/p>\n
Source: The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Flickr is facing a user revolt after a new auto-tagging system labelled images of black people with tags such as \u201cape\u201d and \u201canimal\u201d as well as tagging pictures of concentration camps with \u201csport\u201d or \u201cjungle gym\u201d. The system, which was introduced in early May, uses what Flickr describes as \u201cadvanced image recognition technology\u201d to automatically … Continue reading “Flickr tags blacks as ‘apes’”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2961,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,123],"tags":[11787,156,815,11785,157,11786],"class_list":["post-19091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-world","tag-ape","tag-blacks","tag-concentration-camps","tag-flickr","tag-racism","tag-tags"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2961"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19091"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19092,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19091\/revisions\/19092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}