[rehemiau]

I'm not American and I often see captchas that ask about "cars" or "trucks". And they use similar images. I sometimes don't pass through those. My question is, when I see a truck and I'm being asked to select all cars, should I select the truck or not? For me a truck is a car. Is it not one?

[retsibsi]

That might depend on what 'truck' means to you! Is it equivalent to the British 'lorry', or does it include pickup trucks? I'm Australian, and for me 'truck' means 'lorry', pickups are a kind of ute, utes are a kind of car, and so trucks and cars are clearly distinct. (QED!) There seems to be endless room for cross-cultural ambiguity here though.

[jarek83]

A side quest to yours - when I'm told to select traffic lights - should I include the pieces with just the poles or it's fine to select only the ones with actual lights? I never get through them.

[bserge]

Google it, heh.

The way I learned it, a "car" is any roofed 4+ wheeled vehicle up to van and SUV size (yeah, more Americanisms). Pickup trucks and larger are "trucks".

[dkdbejwi383]

Is the Reliant Robin not a car then?

[bserge]

Ha, you got me!

[lovemenot]

It's not a car. Legally anyway.

[dafoex]

Same goes for a G-Wiz, which is a quadracycle - the same category as an all terrain quad bike.

[naniwaduni]

It's a motortricycle!

[dafoex]

Even this exemplifies bad translations between two dialects of English. To me a van is a Ford Transit, but it sounds like to you a van is a Ford Galaxy (which I'd see as a "people carrier")

[nojokes]

What if Google is the one that requires CAPTCHA? Bingit?

[burlesona]

I think trucks are cars. I would pick any automobile, really even anything with 4+ wheels and a motor. I generally pass those.

The ones that get me are the street sign / street light ones. Do the poles count? What about a tiny edge of the sign that is barely visible in a neighboring square? Ugh.

[purplecats]

that's probably the type of stuff it wants to figure out by throwing it at us

[smcl]

The thing is that "probably" is the entire issue. You might just be training an AI that "truck" is a specific thing in the USA and something else where you happen to live ... or you might also be trying to guess what Google already thinks a "truck" is.

The stakes might be low (you get presented with another captcha) or astronomical (you get your account locked or something). There is literally no way to know with Google, it's a complete black box.

[purplecats]

right but im sure whatever purpose it's using it for is going to be used against the commoners at some level -- weather it be to sell a new service at a higher price point, help further their monopoly, or to better create dark patterns (against us).

they have no "benefit of the doubt" -- it's pretty blatantly clear they are not on "our" side.

[tpxl]

In my country, the Ford F150 truck would be referred to as a car or a "half-truck", while a semi-truck is what would be referred to as a truck. That's a piece of cultural difference that will dirty your training.

[Macha]

It might be called a car or a pickup truck but never just a truck by someone here. While "pickup truck" is an American inherited phrase which has truck in it, they're considered trucks about as much as a catfish is considered a cat.

[tpxl]

> they're considered trucks about as much as a catfish is considered a cat

Well yes, but someone without this knowledge will get confused.

[Macha]

Here is not America, to clarify. I was under the impression that Americans did consider pickups, larger SUVs etc, "trucks"

[WarOnPrivacy]

Generally, Americans consider what marketing tells us to consider.

[canofbars]

Its probably a legit data point to see "Not all verified humans were able to agree on this image"