Articles about AI

"Is it live? Or is it Memorex?" Those of us who’ve been around a while will recall those iconic TV commercials where the announcer challenged the audience to tell the difference between a recorded performance and a live one (or as "live" as a pre-recorded TV spot can be). The idea was that the recording medium -- in this case, Memorex brand audio cassette tapes -- reproduced the full fidelity of the original so faithfully that, in one case, a singer’s high note recorded on one of their tapes literally shattered a nearby wine glass.

I like to think of the above as the first, crude precursor to what today we call "deepfake" technology. But whereas faithfully reproducing audio content has been a net positive for humanity (you wouldn’t be enjoying your MP3s or Spotify streams without those pioneering first steps), deepfake -- or the ability to recreate and/or completely simulate (using AI) both the audio and video representations of a live person -- has been universally panned because of its potential for abuse. After all, in a world full of fake news, it’s not hard to imagine some bad actor deciding to put out bogus recordings (or recreations) of high-profile individuals for personal or political gain.

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Chipotle's recent experiments with allowing artificial intelligence (AI) to handle some elements of phone orders seem to have met the chain's expectations.

After initially launching the option at 10 locations, it rolled out the technology to 1,800 restaurants. Now, Chipotle intends to bring the high-tech system to all its branches by the end of 2019.

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In the same month it was announced that computer pioneer, codebreaker and the father of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Alan Turing, will feature on the new design of the Bank of England's £50 note, a report from IDC suggests that spending across Europe will hit $5.2 billion in 2019 up from 2018 by 49 percent and expected to rise to $13.5bn by 2022.

The race to build machines capable of matching and beating human vision, language understanding, intelligence, and movement is on. Change management and business transformation is one area of business operations where AI could make an exciting impact. In this article, three experts share their thoughts to help to better understand what AI is, how much of what we know is real, what it can and should do, and, most importantly, how it might affect business transformation programs around the world. 

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Data workers are at the center of our ambitious targets for universal artificial intelligence adoption as they are the ones responsible for building the technology on a strong and stable foundation. However, there is one significant hurdle that stands between data workers and designing the perfect AI solution; the talent gap. Recent research has revealed that 44 percent of data workers are wasting time every week because they are unsuccessful in their activities, as they face challenges such as lengthy data preparation processes and a lack of collaboration. If organizations can't attack the data and analytical talent gap head-on, they will increasingly be buried under rising data volumes, complexity and an incomplete understanding as to whether their workflows are doing the job they want.

Without a productive workforce, organizations simply cannot proceed to tackle the technical challenges existing in a data-driven industry, such as reversing the inconsistencies and set-backs with data-led AI projects. With the right analytics platform, data capabilities can be put in the hands of the business experts who not only have the context of the problems to solve but the data sources needed to deliver insights quickly and efficiently. By alleviating data workers of some of the mundane, day-to-day tasks that are consistently clogging up their to-do lists, more time can be allocated to pushing through large-scale AI projects.

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Ever since computers were invented, people have made up stories about how they'd one day become smarter than the humans that made them. While that seemed impossible with the first mega computers that had limited functional capabilities, the idea of an independent computer system is becoming more real with the development of AI.

AI, also known as artificial intelligence, has captured the fascination of people around the world. If it's developed correctly, it could be the next major technology transformation that the world undergoes. It would help many people and change lives, so what progress is being made? Recently, the Brain Simulator II was announced as a major step forward in the advancement of AI. Read on to learn more about this program and what it means for the tech community.

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There's been a fear of automation in the workforce as far back as work has existed. Machines taking jobs away from the people who need them has been and will continue to be a source of anxiety for many.

Though it may seem like a reasonable fear, it's far from reality. Yes, machines are capable of a growing number of increasingly complex tasks, but not every job is at risk of disappearing. Machines can handle menial labor and difficult calculations, but work that requires critical thinking skills is impossible to automate. Things might be different in the movies, but the machines that exist in real life learn through patterns and repetition. There are some jobs where automation doesn't enter the picture at all. So where's the line?

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In the 1979 cult-fiction novel, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, an enormous super computer named Deep Thought took 7.5 million years to conclude that "The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is 42."

He may not have meant it, but what Douglas Adams wrote in 1979 was a portent to why so many questions are being asked about the practical use of AI in business. The recent explosion in AI technology has largely been driven by the availability of large quantities of data, the availability of sufficient computation power and the ever-increasing demand for data analytics to support business strategy. These strategies can be driven by greater efficiency by reducing operating costs or increasing revenue opportunity by improving customer service and product availability.

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Data center environments must stay consistent regarding things like humidity and temperature. Otherwise, the costly equipment inside them could begin malfunctioning. Moreover, data center clients want assurances that the valuable information stored within a facility will be available whenever they need it, and maintaining consistency comes into play there, too.

Here are four ways machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) are upending data center management.

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Primary schools, universities, companies and even all the rest of us have a role to play in preparing for the rise of AI in the workforce. So what can we do to make sure people are still employable as AI starts becoming more common in business settings?

Let's take a look at the work ahead of us.

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There has been a lot of hype around AI to the point where some people are simply tuning it out. I think this is a mistake. While there are limits to what AI can do, there also are sophisticated attacks that we’d miss without it.

The need for AI is driven by three fundamental yet significant changes in the enterprise computing environment.

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An investigation by NBC News has found that photo memories app Ever has been using billions of images uploaded by people to develop a facial recognition system without making it obvious to users.

Ever is a photo storage app that offers "free, unlimited private backup of all your life's memories". It's not until you delve into the company's privacy policy that you learn that in using the service, users are agreeing not only to have their photos used in facial recognition training, but also for Ever to sell the resulting technology to private companies, law enforcement agencies and the military.

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Artificial Intelligence Operations (AIOps) tools are delivering value through proactive IT operations and improved hybrid infrastructure resilience in 87 percent of implementations, according to a new report.

The study from OpsRamp reveals the three biggest benefits of AIOps tools as productivity gains from the elimination of low-value, repetitive tasks across the incident lifecycle (85 percent), rapid issue remediation with faster root cause analysis (80 percent), and better infrastructure performance through noise reduction (77 percent).

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Back in 2015, Shell launched an artificial intelligence-powered assistant for their lubricant service customers. Represented by digital avatars Emma and Ethan, the assistant assists customers with lubricant-related questions and concerns. It’s available around the clock, which means people can reach out at any time of the day or night and receive answers in seconds.

Shell claims that the assistant can handle over 100,000 data sheets for 3,000 products, and understands 16,500 physical characteristics of lubricants. The technology can also provide detailed information to customers about more than 18,500 pack sizes.

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Google has announced that it is closing down its artificial intelligence ethics council following controversy about board members. The Advanced Technology External Advisory Council (ATEAC) was formed just a week ago, but there was strong criticism of the decision to appoint Heritage Foundation president Kay Coles James to the board.

Rightwinger James has a history of opposing LGBTQ rights, and dozens of Google employees signed a petition in protest at her board membership. In response, Google has said that it is "going back the drawing board" and is ending the council.

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OpenAI -- a company backed by Elon Musk -- has created an artificial intelligence system called GPT2 that's capable of writing fake news. The system is also capable of generating works of fiction, and it has been described as being so dangerous that it may not be publicly released.

The stories written by GPT2 have been called "deepfakes for text" and can be generated by feeding the system just a few words. The style is far more sophisticated than most AI-generated text, and the news stories it can generate are so convincing that there are serious concerns about the potential for misuse.

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