'Near' Infinite Compression Possible

[TabrisDarkPeace]

'Near' Infinite Compression Possible
http://slashdot.org/submission/3227361/near-infinite-data-compression-possible

About time is all I can say...



PS: I wasn't sure if to post this in 'Memory & Storage' or 'Networking' as it applies to both stored data (in memory and on disk) and also to data that is in flight (uploading, downloading, streaming, etc. over a network medium).

 

[TabrisDarkPeace]

This might have something to do with Turing getting pardoned...
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2360531

Claude Elwood Shannon (April 30, 1916 – February 24, 2001) and Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck, FRS (April 23, 1858 – October 4, 1947) would also be proud.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

For some reason I read "Near Infinite Comprehension Possible", something I could dearly use.

Shens btw.

 

[ForumMaster]

let's see the specs.

 

[TabrisDarkPeace]

It is getting patented in Australia, and other various G8, G20, etc. nations.

Happy to link to the material on patent.gov websites once it is available and the inventor is acknowledged.

That said, seeing video using more and more of the Internet, and application sizes boom far beyond what current links can do in under 5 minutes... he should not have waited until G.fast technology was being trumpeted as giving us all near 100Mbps to 500Mbps (upstream and downstream possibly in sync).

There's 10 minutes of HD video compressed to under 256KB. The video CODEC is lossy, but the compression applied to the file itself is lossless.

The file does not compress using any traditional compression methods either.

In six months I should be able to link to it and push it to the public Internet.
The method should be public (patent expired) in around 2034, and may go Open Source shortly thereafter.

 

[Puppies04]

It is getting patented in Australia, and other various G8, G20, etc. nations.

Happy to link to the material on patent.gov websites once it is available and the inventor is acknowledged.

That said, seeing video using more and more of the Internet, and application sizes boom far beyond what current links can do in under 5 minutes... he should not have waited until G.fast technology was being trumpeted as giving us all near 100Mbps to 500Mbps (upstream and downstream possibly in sync).

There's 10 minutes of HD video compressed to under 256KB. The video CODEC is lossy, but the compression applied to the file itself is lossless.

The file does not compress using any traditional compression methods either.

In six months I should be able to link to it and push it to the public Internet.
The method should be public (patent expired) in around 2034, and may go Open Source shortly thereafter.

Sounds interesting.

 

[darkxshade]

How do you get near infinity?

 

[SagaLore]

I think its a hoax.

 

[Gibsons]

How do you get near infinity?

divide infinity by 2? :hmm:

 

[TwiceOver]

Sweet. So internet costs should go down infinitely then right?

Just kidding, we never see price decreases from new technology in the services.

 

[Perknose]

Australian student confirms that near infinite data compression is possible.
Patent to be usable by the general public some time in 2034.

The bolded made me question whether I can keep my tech boner going that long.

 

[Jeff7]

I am not explaining anything here on how it works for obvious reasons.

Ah, of course.



Here:
Let x = the entire contents of the Universe.

x


There. 1 byte.

 

[Rakehellion]

near infinite = not infinite

I'm surprised tech people can get away with this drivel.

 

[Ichinisan]

Ah, of course.



Here:
Let x = the entire contents of the Universe.

x


There. 1 byte.

Amazing!

 

[SunnyD]

It's patented by Rodney McKay.

 

[adairusmc]

It's patented by Rodney McKay.

Exactly. It's nice to see some technology from the Atlantis expedition making it into the civilian world finally.

 

[Gargen]

I think its a hoax.

Agreed.

It has many of the hallmarks like grand yet vague promise. For example, "Can shrink Terabytes of data to under 1440KB"... you haven't tested it yet so you can't give us a specific example? Saying "was able to shrink ~3.4TB to under 1440KB in one test" wouldn't risk revealing the process that he's so clearly trying to "protect" (i.e. invent), but would demonstrate the understanding that somebody that's actually used it should have.

It has vague references to somebody else verifying the technology. I don't think "Student from Canberra, Australia confirms that 'near' infinite data compression is possible" means anything. "Professor" would at least be a better appeal for legitimacy, but even then, it's not worth much without knowing who, and hearing it from the person that confirmed it themselves.

It scores a 75 on the crackpot index by my count (items 10, 14(x5), and 26). It could be a lot higher if I was more liberal in interpreting some of the questions (the index was built for "bad science" rather than "bad technology").


EDIT: Just followed the link in the slashdot page to the source. I'm actually starting to feel kinda bad so I'm not gonna give the full hack job, but suffice it to say that index score could go a lot higher. I'm guessing that this is a case of an amateur programmer having a cool idea about something along the lines of re-compressing compressed data, running it by a friend/colleague (the "student"), and then telling everyone how awesome it's gonna be before actually developing it.

 

[Soundmanred]

Related:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2361178

 

[DrPizza]

Complete and utter bullshit.

A high school student is not going to break mathematics. There are theoretical limits to compression (unless you're not worried about uncompressing that data. Here's a compressed blu-ray of Pirates of the Caribbean, download it at your leisure: 0101001 In fact, if it were possible to compress it to that data size, then if we compressed every movie ever made, There are only 128 possible compressed files.

(Edit: to the idiot sounding the alarm at the MPAA, not really - that was sarcasm)

Wtf does "near infinite" even mean? I don't even have to look at the OP's article to be fairly certain that the claims are bullshit. Invented by a high school student? Now I'm absolutely certain.

Here, this explains it in more detail at an easy to understand level:
http://matt.might.net/articles/why-infinite-or-guaranteed-file-compression-is-impossible/

I suppose I should probably be banning The OP simply on the grounds of spamming, but it seems that if anyone is going to tear his nonsense apart, it would be on a tech forum.

 

[Rakehellion]

Complete and utter bullshit.

A high school student is not going to break mathematics. There are theoretical limits to compression (unless you're not worried about uncompressing that data. Here's a compressed blu-ray of Pirates of the Caribbean, download it at your leisure: 0101001 In fact, if it were possible to compress it to that data size, then if we compressed every movie ever made, There are only 128 possible compressed files.

(Edit: to the idiot sounding the alarm at the MPAA, not really - that was sarcasm)

Wtf does "near infinite" even mean? I don't even have to look at the OP's article to be fairly certain that the claims are bullshit. Invented by a high school student? Now I'm absolutely certain.

Here, this explains it in more detail at an easy to understand level:
http://matt.might.net/articles/why-infinite-or-guaranteed-file-compression-is-impossible/

I suppose I should probably be banning The OP simply on the grounds of spamming, but it seems that if anyone is going to tear his nonsense apart, it would be on a tech forum.

There were claims of compressing an "HD" video using lossy compression to 256KB.

 

[Capt Caveman]

Come on guys, a blog by a student making a claim with nothing to back it up has to be true!

 

[DrPizza]

There were claims of compressing an "HD" video using lossy compression to 256KB.

Ohhhhh, lossy compression. Well, hell, let me compress my original compressed file of the Caribbean: 01
There. I compressed it a lot further. It's a bit lossy though.

 

[Ken g6]

Any chance this is viral marketing for tomorrow's Person of Interest rerun, "2πR"? (Episode 34.) It has a plot quite similar to this.

 

[Ferzerp]

Any chance this is viral marketing for tomorrow's Person of Interest rerun, "2πR"? (Episode 34.) It has a plot quite similar to this.

Well, it's obviously a traffic generating scheme. The link should be scrubbed. It isn't even an accepted Slashdot story anyway. It's a submitted story, which anyone can do. The obvious BS will never be an accepted story. The OP is most definitely the person who submitted the BS story.

ATF is sadly really strong for SEO. I've accidentally had pictures I've posted end up on the first page of results for pretty generic terms in google image search before just by posting them in a popular thread.


Step 1: submit BS story and spam the internet with links to it.
Step 2: ?????
Step 3: Profit

 

[Markbnj]

Can shrink Terabytes of data to under 1440KB

It only works on special data that is all 0's.