WangNet – 1.8 MB, zero-dependency Numberwang adjudication in 11 languages

151 points by Liogra123 13 hours ago on hackernews | 52 comments

For those confused by this, here is the Mitchell and Webb "Numberwang" sketch

https://youtu.be/0obMRztklqU?is=qufDLUkqofpr-K1Y

And that's a bad miss...

My favorite line, especially as an American because I can say it out loud without the person getting upset since they have no frame of reference. And other Anglophiles I could probably handle.

: tialaramex | 10 hours ago
The idea that the snooker commentators are probably drinking is very Britain, and especially Britain from a particular era.
I think that series came out slightly after that era ended, I remember as a child (so years earlier) realising that snooker players at the time were often tipsy if not actually drunk, and also darts players, but by the time I was an adult the professionalism really changed that, turns out that if you're very good you probably are better at snooker when sober. I think the commentators, being often a previous generation of players, lagged that slightly.

toyg | 10 hours ago

"Are we the baddies?"

"WATCH THE FOOTBALL! WATCH IT! IT'S GONNA MOVE!!"

"This tree smells like cum."

Mitchell and Webb had so many legendary lines.

: codeulike | 10 hours ago
"there's everything to play for ...
... And forever to play it in!"
: tonymillion | 7 hours ago
Now we know...
: yoz | 6 hours ago
She's gone, sir. They've all gone. And we're back. The incredibly posh people who are still unaccountably waiters.

shervinafshar | 12 hours ago

And here's the history of Numberwang: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ofnDdi-vfw

: codeulike | 11 hours ago
And so OPs app should have been called Colloson I guess

grufkork | 11 hours ago

Rotate the board!

: BLKNSLVR | 10 hours ago
This is the comment I was looking for!

pimlottc | 11 hours ago

Featuring Academy Award winner Olivia Colman!

gabrielsroka | 11 hours ago

There are many sketches

codeulike | 44 minutes ago

Sadly OPs explanatory comment has been flagged into oblivion (see far below) because the automod could not comprehend the importance of NUMBERWANG

tazjin | 12 hours ago

I don't think that this produces correct results, as it seems to determine whether each individual number is Numberwang. However, whether a number is Numberwang can also depend on the previous numbers in the sequence or other factors.

So I think as it stands right now this model can only determine whether a number would be Numberwang as the first number of a sequence, but even for that I still wouldn't rely on this in the actual game show.

wrs | 12 hours ago

Do we really know that? Or have we only seen the sequences from people searching for Numberwang? Has a number been both Numberwang (or Wangernumb) and not Numberwang (or Wangernumb)?

tazjin | 11 hours ago

Yeah, we do - there's a famous episode where after rotating the board both contestants stubbornly kept picking 1, and after a couple of iterations one of them was Wangernumb.

wrs | 10 hours ago

Oh, well, after rotating the board, sure, I get that.

debugnik | 10 hours ago

I can confirm this is the first episode, which I just watched since I had no idea about Numberwang until a minute ago. So I guess a true Numberwang fan would know that.

: gaigalas | 8 hours ago
Obviously, it depends on whether board has rotated or not. It seems the model doesn't support board rotation yet, so the result is consistent with the limited set of features.

aesthesia | 12 hours ago

I'm also not sure that we know a non-number can never be Numberwang.

ceocoder | 11 hours ago

A non-number could be either a Numberwang OR a Wanganumb - this does depend on whether Yorkshire is a pudding or not.

: jmcqk6 | 10 hours ago
It's not well known, but in February of 1983, there was a finch in the Galapagos that was found to be numberwang. And of course there was the famous incident in the 1994 World Series where a homerun was overturned because it turned out it was a wangernumb hit into the stands, and not a standard baseball.

aidenn0 | 8 hours ago

If you think about The Event you can figure it out. (Don't think about The Event).

: blipvert | an hour ago
It is unlikely to be necessary on HN to remind readers to remain indoors.

TechSquidTV | 4 hours ago

Woah believe it or not, that's Numberwang!

stackghost | 12 hours ago

Hello I have a question, and my question is what the fuck

dofm | 11 hours ago

That's not even a number.

tclancy | 11 hours ago

In some bases it is. Numberwang!

With All Due Love,

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar, Esq.

: TZubiri | 9 hours ago
In some bases, that's a forbidden number containing the recipe for the atom bomb
You reckless fool

julianz | 2 hours ago

Congratulations, you are one of today's 10,000!

numberwan9 | 11 hours ago

Hey! I was not consulted?

bonyt | 11 hours ago

You're playing with fire here, don't forget the tragedy of Colosson. Computers weren't meant to do this.

: Hackbraten | 10 hours ago
I AM COLOSSON I AM NUMBERWANG THE WORLD IS NUMBERWANG THEREFORE I AM THE WORLD

jl6 | 11 hours ago

Amazing, I passed by Mornington Crescent only yesterday!

: tialaramex | 10 hours ago
I happened to be born at the right time for Mornington Crescent to be temporarily closed in the exact window when I was travelling to London often, using the Tube on my own, and listening to ISIHAC and so for a while I assumed the joke was that it'll never open - and then one day of course it re-opened.
: yoz | 6 hours ago
I tried to pass Mornington Crescent the other day, but I was in Knip; bloody typical. As you’d expect, I ended up double-shunting onto the Victoria Line.

rsamtravis | 10 hours ago

Numberwang??

da02 | 9 hours ago

How did you all first learn about the original Numberwang? Netflix?

: karim79 | 8 hours ago
Here is the history:
https://youtu.be/6ofnDdi-vfw?is=y9ccxKyAQfqiPIQs
: shervinafshar | 8 hours ago
I knew the Mitchell and Webb duo from _The Peep Show_ and one day (long before the pandemic) I saw a comment on Slashdot about working from home linking to this sketch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=co_DNpTMKXk
Then I watched that show and learned about Numberwang.
: IslandRebel | 7 hours ago
I was forced to watch their atrocious sketch show while waiting in someone's house before we departed for the local pub.
: mellosouls | 2 hours ago
Some of us aren't American! (Or young)
In the UK we watched it on the Beeb when it was aired.

TZubiri | 9 hours ago

What's the training corpus, just the canonical Mitchell and Webb sketch? Or ancilliary data like comments and references, or worse synthetic data generated on the primary sources?

karim79 | 9 hours ago

This is hilarious and I miss numberwang. Also, the history of numberwang. And everything to do with numberwang. It was the most prescient sport back in the day.

I'm glad that someone has stepped up to revive the legacy of numberwang.

karim79 | 8 hours ago

My friends, this is the single most hilarious thread I have ever experienced on the Interwebs. I am deeply grateful to have found this. I feel like my life is now complete.

gregjw | 8 hours ago

thats Numberwang!

gaigalas | 8 hours ago

Looking forward for the wordwang version.

bosshawg | 7 hours ago

what's going on with python that this is considered zero-dependency? requirements.txt, import gradio?

: minitech | 5 hours ago
> gradio is needed only for the demo. The model itself never needs it.
The “Usage” section doesn’t involve installing any dependencies, for example: https://github.com/GraafHenk/numberwang#usage

voidUpdate | 31 minutes ago

Is this using the rules from the official board game?