Vesuvius Challenge 2023 Grand Prize awarded: we can read the scrolls! | Vesuvius Challenge

  • “What did it take?” ⤴️
  • “An inspiring goal and a clear target.” ⤴️
  • “A solid starting point. The foundation was laid by Dr. Seales and his team. They spent two decades making the first scroll scans, building Volume Cartographer, demonstrating the first success in virtual unwrapping, and proving that Herculaneum ink can be detected in CT.” ⤴️
  • “we blended competition and cooperation by adding “progress prizes” along the way. These were smaller prizes (often in the $1,000-10,000 range) every ~2 months. To win a progress prize, you had to publish your code or research as open source, thereby benefiting the entire community.” ⤴️
  • “A Grand Prize on its own would suffer from information “hoarding”: no one would share their intermediate work” ⤴️
  • “Besides “leveling up” the entire community, this had several side benefits. We generated buzz and excitement in the community, which was motivating for everyone. It allowed winners to re-invest their winnings into better equipment, compute time, or even reduced hours at work or study to dedicate more to the competition. And it allowed people to find each other and form teams — like we saw with the Grand Prize winners.” ⤴️
  • “We were not dogmatically attached to just being referees; we were willing to run out onto the field and kick the ball a little. So we did what we thought would maximize success, and for the critical bottleneck of segmentation, that meant hiring a team.” ⤴️
  • “labeling work is tedious and time consuming, and turned out to have a long learning curve, so it’s desirable to guarantee some compensation” ⤴️
  • “Our success was the result of many smaller breakthroughs by a broad group of people. It’s remarkable how many things had to come together to make this happen. Remove any of these, and we would not have succeeded, at least not within this timeframe.” ⤴️
  • “Some members of our papyrology team say that revealing this text will be the greatest revolution in the classics since the Renaissance. However it goes, it will certainly be fun to try!” ⤴️
  • “What did it take?” ⤴️
  • “An inspiring goal and a clear target.” ⤴️
  • “A solid starting point. The foundation was laid by Dr. Seales and his team. They spent two decades making the first scroll scans, building Volume Cartographer, demonstrating the first success in virtual unwrapping, and proving that Herculaneum ink can be detected in CT.” ⤴️
  • “we blended competition and cooperation by adding “progress prizes” along the way. These were smaller prizes (often in the $1,000-10,000 range) every ~2 months. To win a progress prize, you had to publish your code or research as open source, thereby benefiting the entire community.” ⤴️
  • “A Grand Prize on its own would suffer from information “hoarding”: no one would share their intermediate work” ⤴️
  • “Besides “leveling up” the entire community, this had several side benefits. We generated buzz and excitement in the community, which was motivating for everyone. It allowed winners to re-invest their winnings into better equipment, compute time, or even reduced hours at work or study to dedicate more to the competition. And it allowed people to find each other and form teams — like we saw with the Grand Prize winners.” ⤴️
  • “We were not dogmatically attached to just being referees; we were willing to run out onto the field and kick the ball a little. So we did what we thought would maximize success, and for the critical bottleneck of segmentation, that meant hiring a team.” ⤴️
  • “labeling work is tedious and time consuming, and turned out to have a long learning curve, so it’s desirable to guarantee some compensation” ⤴️
  • “Our success was the result of many smaller breakthroughs by a broad group of people. It’s remarkable how many things had to come together to make this happen. Remove any of these, and we would not have succeeded, at least not within this timeframe.” ⤴️
  • “Some members of our papyrology team say that revealing this text will be the greatest revolution in the classics since the Renaissance. However it goes, it will certainly be fun to try!” ⤴️