September means it’s time for The Loebner Prize, the annual recognition for advances in AI. This award is meant for any AI that achieves or exceeds human capacity, passing the Turing test, and to date, none have won. The Loebner Prize Originating in 1990 by Hugh Loebner, each year a winner stands to receive a grand prize of $100,000 for advances in AI within textual, visual, and auditory categories.

In addition to the grand prize, there are two $25,000 purses for the first AI that judges cannot distinguish from a real human in at least one of the categories. We are still awaiting winners for all of these. Bronze Prize Winners Since the Loebner prize was first offered, there have been 14 separate winners of the annual ‘best of’ prize, 3 of these winners claiming the prize in 4 separate years each. They won $2,000 – 3,000 as the entry closest to meeting the Turing test requirements. • Joseph Weintraub was the first winner of the annual $2,000 prize, and he went on to win 4 of the first 5 years of the Loebner prize.

His 1991 bot submission, “Whimsical Conversation,” was built to converse in small talk and non-sequitor sentences to appear more human. Primitive by today’s standards, Wintraub’s bot was remarkably advanced at the time. Judges identified the bot as a computer, but they also identified some of the human participants as computers. Weintraub won the bronze prize of $2,000. He went on to steadily improve his chatterbot over the following years, winning again in 1992, 1993, and 1995 with his renamed, “PC Therapist” program. • Bruce Wilcox won the Loebner Bronze prize in 2010, 2011, 2014, and 2015. Leading up to these wins, Wilcox started by writing interpreter programs and then moving to games programming in the late 1970’s and 1980’s, through 2012. In 2010, Wilcox’s chatbot, Suzette, fooled 1 of the 4 judges into believing that it was human on the other end of the conversation and won him the bronze prize.

An improved version, Rosette, won in 2011. His most recent version, Rose, won 2nd place in 2013 and then won the bronze prize in 2014 and 2015. • Steve Worswick is the only Loebner prize winner to win 4 awards with the same program, Mitsuku. In addition to the recent 2018 win, this program also won the Loebner bronze prize in 2013, 2016, and 2017. Worswick has worked on the program since 2005, and it continues to advance. Mitsuku is available to chat through Mousebreaker games online. Very convincingly, this AI portrays itself as an 18-year-old woman from England and can very accurately chat with humans on the other side, hundreds of thousands of times a day.

During the most recent Loebner prize competition, 2 of the 4 judges ranked it as the best bot in the competition, making it the winner of the highest prize awarded. Will 2019 Bring A Winner? No one has ever won a silver prize or the Loebner grand prize as of yet. Will this be the year that an AI can fool all the judges into believing they interact with a human? Even if the answer remains no, the winners of the bronze category will still create excitement for and demonstrate the progress made in AI. Stay tuned!

As much as the online giants seem to squeeze brick-and-mortar retailers, when you need milk at 10 o’clock at night, they can’t beat the convenience of stopping in at the local grocery store. …And the brick-and-mortar stores are taking advantage of this competitive edge. Using advances in AI, the brick-and-mortar retailers are finding ways to make the most profit from your 10-minute trip to their store for milk.

Blue Light Special In Your Pocket

Do you remember the blue light special? The blue revolving light was placed prominently in front of items a store wanted to sell most. Now, location-based advertising is the blue light and the flashing is a buzz from the phone in your pocket alerting you to a ‘special offer’ on frozen pizzas, which you are currently staring at. When you push your cart over to the toy aisle, now your phone buzzes again with another offer, this one for a toy car at 20% off. This is AI at work; marketers’ software knows where your phone is located through the store app you downloaded and pushes out tailored ads.

Profiting From Patterns

Behind the scenes, big-box retailers are using artificial intelligence to sift through tens of thousands of transactions to correlate items that are most frequently bought together. The algorithms find patterns, and the stores learn ways to sell goods better.

For example, what else do people buy who came to purchase new plumbing supplies or lightbulbs at the home goods store? Is there a pattern? Those add-ons can then be pushed to sell to anyone else purchasing plumbing or lightbulbs. Expand this to all items, and suddenly, those patterns reveal very specific and profitable ways to generate sales.

Other patterns are also sought:  what do consumers who buy plumbing supplies purchase on their next trip? Did anyone buying lightbulbs also purchase household cleaners? What is the length of time that consumers wait between return trips? Data analytics like these allows retailers to design store layouts more strategically and push products most likely to result in a sale.

Safer Stores Mean Cost Savings

AI might also enhance loss prevention practices. Advances in facial and behavioral recognition software currently employed in more secure facilities might appear in retail stores to prevent thefts, a contributing factor to stores that must increase prices to offset their losses. It might become possible to predict when someone is likely to shoplift before they do so, tracking images against data about shady body language, typical patterns of movement throughout the floor as criminals case the store, or eye movements that pay attention to locations of store personnel rather than the items on the shelves.

Who’s Afraid Of The Big Bad Wolf?

By using programs with artificial intelligence platforms to track consumer behavior, send push notifications, keep costs down, and influence marketing strategies, the brick-and-mortar stores are keeping up against the odds. Like the tale about the big bad wolf who couldn’t blow down the brick house, the online retailers are pushing, but the brick-and-mortar stores are still standing, thanks in part to innovations with AI.

A year and a half ago, there were a few websites that offered online chat, but only during business hours. Now, almost every retail, cell phone, or travel site has a bot that’s always ready to chat. Do they really have someone standing by just for a chat? The answer is, of course, “No.” Instead of an employee typing to you in the wee hours of the morning, there is an artificial intelligence on the other end of the line. You’ve reached a Chatbot.

“How Can I Help You?”

Practically indistinguishable from a human on the other side of the keyboard, chatbots are constantly getting better at answering our questions, predicting our needs, and knowing when to change over to a live person.

The days of Chatbots answering our questions about an interesting product, a cell phone feature, or hotel experience is just the beginning. In the future, these emerging AI programs are going to become vital to our daily lives.

“What Is Your Emergency?”

The idea of emergency services being administered by an AI sounds scary. Can we ever trust a bot in our hour of need? But, as these machines respond and predict our needs better, they are a natural fit to help us through a crisis, too.

Imagine calling 911 and being connected to an operator who never gets rattled, never mis-speaks, and instantly knows your location to send help. Chatbots would make decisions based on algorithms and calculations all while keeping cool under pressure. Most importantly, these AI’s will be able to draw on thousands or even millions of previous calls from all other Chatbots to learn and adapt, perhaps dispatching help before you’re done explaining your need.

“Enjoy Your Flight!”

Airports can be overwhelming even to a seasoned traveler who’s under duress to catch a flight on-time. Shifting schedules, delays, or cancelations add stress to air travel, but trying to get an answer to a question makes it worse—ticket counters are jammed, staff is minimal, and while you’re dutifully waiting in line to ask about your gate number, your plane might be taking off!

Enter Chatbots. Instead of fighting through a crowd of people to get to the information desk or wandering around looking for signs to point you in the right direction, banks of AI Chatbots are starting to pop up at airports around the world. These are more than the self-check-in kiosks you may be familiar with; expect airport Chatbots to be fully interactive, offering easy-to navigate on-screen questions, directions, and options.

In the not-too-distant future, these may come equipped with a projected virtual assistant, in the airline uniform, to listen to your question and respond with a friendly smile in your native language to help you on your way.

“Did That Answer Your Question?”

Perhaps the most popular of Chatbots are those already in our homes. Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant are all AI Chatbots programmed to respond to our voices. These AI systems are getting more and more sophisticated by the day.

While they sound mechanical and cold as of yet, the day is quickly coming that the voice we hear will be warmer, more convincingly human, and conversation will become more naturally integrated with our daily lives. In the very near future, thanks to Chatbot technology, our mornings may start with a full conversation with Alexa or Siri.

“Goodbye. …And Have A Good Day, Dear!”

As one of the first types of AI with which we’ve become comfortable, Chatbots have proven our capability to embrace machine interactions. As these bots integrate more and more seamlessly into our society, will we begin to prefer bot responses over humans –or, will we even notice any difference?

Artificial intelligence is a misunderstood technology. Although everybody wants to know it and each business may want to invest in it, the truth actually is that many still don’t understand what AI actually is and what it can offer. As marketers look to outperform competitors, many assumptions and exaggerations regarding the capabilities of AI have been flying all over. For example, there is confusion about the difference between machine learning, deep learning, and AI. For this reason, you should consider knowing a few things for you to determine whether AI is right for your company or not.

As a starting point, we begin with the definition of artificial intelligence. This term is largely misunderstood due to what some perceive as its consequences. For instance, some people believe that as a result of artificial intelligence, robots will come and take over jobs through applications as digital assistants such as Alexa and Siri. However AI is a broad concept that includes machine learning, natural language processing, among other concepts. AI can be further divided into narrow AI and general AI. While narrow AI is suited for narrow tasks and includes technologies such as recommendation engines, chatbots, and other apps, general AI entails machines carrying out any task that humans can perform and is yet to be developed fully.

Secondly, there is a perception that AI will replace humans. However, AI will not replace human beings and their jobs but will only replace repetitive jobs that do not require highly qualified humans to perform them. It allows executives in businesses to make more accurate decisions by predicting, classifying and clustering information and decisions. Therefore, AI will not only help your business by eliminating repetitive tasks but will also make the rest of the duties simple.

For instance, in a business setup, using Robo-advisors to analyze data reduces the time that is used to find the information needed to make a crucial business decision. Expert advisors can also be useful in eliminating fraud and detecting flaws in specific tasks. As opposed to eliminating humans from tasks, it will ease those tasks and allow humans to intervene in unusual cases. The advancement of AI should be a signal for organizations to adjust their job profiles and offer retraining to match the changing duties.

Thirdly, before coming up with an AI strategy, you should know that not every business needs AI. You should consider the potential implications of AI and find out how this technology can be applied to solve problems your company faces.  Unfortunately, many people have been duped into believing that every business should adopt AI and their strategy end up failing miserably before it even starts. Many companies have lost a lot of cash in such cases.  Therefore, decisions on whether you need AI for your company or not should be based on research and consideration just like any other business strategy you implement in your organization.

With the hype of AI everywhere, it is important that you carry out extensive research and understand key terms, tools, and technologies that make up this strategy. This will put you at a place where you understand this technology and implement it to the advantage of your business.

Artificial intelligence could revolutionize the IT help desk, reports Tech Republic. 

As a system administrator working in technology for more than 25 years, I've provided some measure of IT support. While it's rewarding to help people, sometimes the monotony in doing so can lead to feeling unfulfilled, especially when there are better and more promising tasks afoot—if you can just find time to work on them

Read the article on Tech Republic

According to Science Friday, artificial technology is creeping into law enforcement applications and it is time to set clear standards about what is fair and legal.

Facial recognition technology is all around us—it’s at concerts, airports, and apartment buildings. But its use by law enforcement agencies and courtrooms raises particular concerns about privacy, fairness, and bias, according to Jennifer Lynch, the Surveillance Litigation Director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Read the article on Science Friday

Artificial intelligence is helping filmmakers create films, but will that lead to the end of artistic freedom, reports Yahoo Entertainment. 

Artificial intelligence is everywhere: It can drive a car, chat with customers, or help patients with neuronal damage to recover their potential. But if data-assisted moviemaking can help predict a movie’s outcome, what room is there left for artistic freedom?

Read the article on Yahoo Entertainment

According to Energy.gov, the United States has created a Department of Artificial Intelligence. The office will coordinate all the AI project the Department of Energy is involved in. 

Today, U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick Perry announced the establishment of the DOE Artificial Intelligence and Technology Office (AITO).

Read the article on Energy.gov

With breach attempts and cyberattacks increasing, many companies say artificial intelligence (AI) is a necessity in identifying and thwarting threats, and they are devoting bigger pieces of the budget for AI’s role in cybersecurity. “It’s a fundamental tool going forward due to the approaching reality of the 5G-enabled world, where massive amounts of data will need to be analyzed in real time,” says J. Eduardo Campos, co-founder with his wife, Erica, of Embedded-Knowledge Inc. (www.embedded-knowledge.com) and co-author with her of From Problem Solving to Solution Design: Turning Ideas into Actions. 

“5G will empower machine-to-machine communications, and the new wireless technology will be faster, carry more information per second, and interconnect sensors, devices, and computers at large scale.

“With more data flowing at higher speeds, only AI solutions will be able to handle such high volume of transactions while monitoring applications and sensors at the edge of companies’ networks.”

Campos offers some reasons AI is an effective cybersecurity tool for businesses:

• System-entry protection. AI systems can scan the retina and fingerprints for biometric logins, identifying small changes in patterns — a more secure point of entry than traditional passwords provide. “Hackers cracking passwords open Pandora’s Box,” Campos says. “Passwords are vulnerable to cyberattacks, and personal information such as credit cards are easily compromised. Changing passwords alone isn’t a solution. Biometric systems lower your risk of breaches because biological characteristics are hard to duplicate.”  
• Enhanced threat detection and attack prevention. Cybersecurity firms are training AI systems to detect malware and viruses by using special algorithms. “This enables AI to use pattern recognition, which helps identify malicious software and isolate them,” Campos says. “AI systems are being trained to recognize ransomware before it encrypts. The predictive analytics AI uses are much faster than a manual approach.”
• Time and cost saving. The average overall time to detect threats and respond to breaches is reduced by up to 12%. “This time reduction occurs by repeatedly scanning for anomalies that show threat patterns,” Campos says. “AI used in fraud detection has saved some companies millions.”
• Natural language processing. This is a subfield of computer science, information engineering and AI related to programming computers to process natural language data and narrow down the most pertinent information. “AI-powered systems can collect data for reference by scanning articles and studies on cyber threats, helping organizations prepare effective strategies,” Campos says. 

“There is still no guarantee against a cyberattack,” Campos says. “But AI certainly takes cybersecurity a step further, and businesses of all sizes are taking notice at a time when threats are always knocking at the door.” 

Eduardo Campos is co-author with his wife, Erica, ofFrom Problem Solving to Solution Design: Turning Ideas into Actions. Campos spent 13 years at Microsoft, first as a cybersecurity advisor, then leading innovative projects at the highest levels of government in the U.S. and abroad.  His consulting firm, Embedded Knowledge Inc. (www.embedded-knowledge.com), works with organizations and entrepreneurs developing customized business strategies and forming partnerships focused on designing creative solutions to complex problems.

Artificial Intelligence is slowly taking over our day to day lives - especially when it comes to the workplace and using tech to enhance and fast-track tasks.

There are many sectors in which AI can help improve services - specifically national health services, banking and legal services. Not only do some of the biggest names in tech debate over the future of AI and how it continues to make life easier and better for many, but we are now seeing some of the biggest tech companies now recruiting heavily in AI.

But, who is recruiting for AI roles the most and is making big steps in looking toward the future?

With AI-related jobs more than doubling over the past three years and job postings related to AI increasing by 119%, RS Components has analysed job posts from some of the world’s biggest tech companies to discover who has the highest percentage of AI-related job openings.

Microsoft leads the way with 1,964 AI job openings, equating to 36% of the total jobs they have on offer. With Bill Gates being one of the world’s richest people still, this is no surprise - Microsoft still leads the way with some of the most innovative and thought-provoking technological inventions.

Nvidia follows in second place with 837 of AI job openings, equating to 33% of total jobs they have on offer. The computer game company designs graphic processing units for the gaming and professional markets, so using systems and analytics such as AI helps with processes and development of new games.

A former Google Exec has predicted that AI will replace 40 per cent of jobs in the next 15 years. The Google Exec stated that AI will allow entire new industries to be built from the ground up with automation in mind. AI will be cheaper than human employees, however, it will also create new roles, as well as replace current ones.

Popular social media platform Facebook and streaming platform Netflix make it into the top ten with Facebook offering 191 jobs in AI, 6% of the total, and Netflix offering 35, also making up 6% of the total jobs they have on offer. Both companies are growing rapidly and are having to set new trends to keep up with technology, so it's only right that they are in the top 10 companies that are hiring in AI the most.

The largest tech company in the world, Apple, comes in at number 12 with 129 AI jobs on offer, only 3% of their total 4,574 jobs available. Apple is one of the most innovative companies in the world - alongside Google - so it may come as a surprise that they are in 12th place. This could be due to the fact that they are forward-thinking and hired the majority of their AI roles a few years back.

Another innovative company in the technology business is Bezos' e-commerce platform, Amazon, which comes in 15th place offering 297 roles in AI, 2% of its total 18,781 jobs on offer.

It’s clear that the technology sector prioritises hiring in AI, but which sectors will be next to drive up the market and start boosting their recruitment in AI?

Take a look at RS Components’ interactive campaign here which highlights all of the companies which are recruiting in AI.

Top Ten Global Companies with highest % of AI Jobs:

At present many businesses are deploying the use of AI-enabled chatbots and have discovered them to be the future of engagement between an organization and its customers.

AI enabled chatbots offer many benefits to a business and are revolutionizing the customer service industry; they act as interactive agents in the daily operation of an organization while improving sales processes.

In addition, AI enabled chatbots also help organizations solve problems with the aim of building brand loyalty.

Reasons why businesses need AI - Enabled chatbots

AI enabled chatbots are working because most organizations have discovered that they are capable of enhancing the customer's experience and also doing the following:

• Chatbots are more efficient in some specialized task: There are so many tasks that can be done quickly and more efficiently by chatbots than by humans. A task such as ordering pizza, hiring a cab, and checking weather conditions can be done efficiently using a chatbot, businesses can also use chatbots in automating tasks like inventory ordering and management.
• Chatbots provide better service on tablets and smartphones: At present, the world is moving towards an immersive mobile phone future, and the numbers of people who own mobile phones are now above those who own laptops and PCs. Chatbots on mobile are helping to create more streamlined app interfaces which enable users to buy, compare, browse and get support all from a single interface.
• Chatbots can help businesses scale up operations: Chatbots also have the ability to help a business scale up its operation; this is because they reduce human error. Whereas a human can handle a limited number of conversations, chatbots can handle multiple conversations at a time. Therefore employing the use of chatbot to complement human effort can boost business and help scale up its operation.
• Take loads off from customer support team: For a business that gets lots of inquiries from customers on a daily basis, the use of chatbots can help take loads off the customer support team. By acting as the first point of contact, chatbots can help to screen calls from customers and redirect to human agents only when required.
• Chatbots can assist customers in getting the right products: If you operate a business that sells goods and services which are similar to each other, chatbots can help customers in deciding the best product choice for them.
• Chatbots are also a prudent investment: If your products are directed to millennials who prefer to make comparisons before buying a product. Chatbots can help them make comparisons and ease them into a purchase decision.
• Promotes interactive marketing campaign: The use of chatbot also helps to promote an interactive marketing campaign; this is because they do not present a passive user experience. Also, the availability of chatbots on platforms like Facebook Messenger and others means that you can get in touch with more people at once.
• Drive organizational efficiency: The use of chatbots also helps businesses to save money from backend support. Instead of employing more people to perform repetitive and mundane tasks, chatbot business solutions can help automate processes and streamline tasks.

Finally, as the world moves towards a digital future and more conversational way of doing things, we can expect that chatbots will continue replace human assistance and deliver better more efficient customer service.

Cloud Computing allows for data to be stored in a decentralized fashion, allowing access to those with the right security credentials, no matter the device. As a result of the portable nature of file storage and sharing, a new type of user has cropped up: the Nomad, one who rejects the need for hardware and who is a direct by-product of the benefits of cloud computing which uses far less hardware per user than individual PCs or even centralized servers for a company

– And it’s no surprise that Millennials are leading the charge when it comes to mainstreaming this form of work and lifestyle. Millennials are more mobile than any generation before; it’s not a far stretch for Millennials to become Nomadic users—in many ways, they always have been.

Millennials have grown up with technology, blending it into their lives almost constantly. Portable movies on small, inset DVD players in the car salvaged long family car trips, eliminating fights from the back seat; music stored on small, portable devices allowed large quantities of music files to create instant access to songs any time, freeing teenagers from the confines of radio broadcasts; and of course, cell phones made communication portable, making the era of pay-phones and waiting to make calls obsolete.

Notice that the key word here is portable. Millennials are accustomed to technology allowing instant access and being available at their fingertips at any time. Therefore, when this generation entered the workforce and their new employers walked them over to a cubicle with a tangle of cords from monitors, PCs, and desk phones, it’s no wonder that they balked at and rejected the traditional office.

And others followed suit; Gen X employees--no strangers to technology and equally engaged albeit as adopters rather than native users of portable tech--agreed and soon joined the movement for a looser, less restricted style of workplace. Companies began to evolve and respond by allowing less stringent policies about working remotely. It became time to find a way to disconnect from the office while still connecting to the work; corporate America entered the Cloud.

The effect of cloud computing eliminated a need for hardware or even centralized servers for a company. Employees could work from anywhere. It was no longer necessary to have four walls and an outlet. Work wasn’t restricted to a 9-to-5 day. A company could hire its workforce from anywhere in the world.

With the portability of work, many Millennials (soon to be followed by Gen Z) and even some Gen Xers became Nomadic users, logging in and working from anywhere. Some even took the concept to an extreme, choosing to live as true Nomads, traveling the country or even the world while still holding down a job, even giving rise to a new form of lifestyle, a Vandweller.

All thanks to the Cloud, it’s no longer necessary to have a street address in order to work for a living…you just need an IP address.

I am not going to go into the long term future of AI because that would be highly speculative. I would rather focus on the short term future of AI, much of which is already taking place. For the purpose of this article I want to focus on AI-powered hyper-contextualization and how that impacts our realities. AI means that we can crunch insane amounts of data points together in order to map out and ultimately predict behavior. When it comes to content, this hyper-contextualization allows content to be curated according to personal taste. We already see this in social media for instance with curated feeds according to personal. political and religious preferences.

The result is that we become exposed to content that aligns with how we already think. So rather than be challenged by different lines of thought that force us to reconsider our points of view, these points of view are reinforced. Gaps between groups become wider and more challenging to bridge because the common ground is lost.

Now when you take it a few steps further, we can envision a world where content is curated at a sentence level to match audience preferences. Imagine reading an online article in which every sentence is devised to match your preference in tone, style, political alignment, biases etc.

Human thought has a binary nature. Right and wrong. Up and down. Forward and backward. Thought evolves through polarities. What happens to thought once you minimize the dialogical nature of ideas and make them monologues, with each idea further corroborating past behavior. tendencies and biases. I don't know what happens, but it certainly does not look like something positive to me.

In sharing lives with other humans, we run into conflicts constantly. Unlike AI, people are not necessarily consistently able to smartly predict what we are going to do next. As AI evolves, predicting where we are going to go before we even type an address on a map navigator, or what we want to buy for our home before even beginning a search in a marketplace, we become more and more unaccustomed to having explain how we think, what we want, and why we want it. AI can create the illusion that the world is made to the taste of each individual. Psychologically this could easily foment a scenario of social withdrawal and lack of desire to engage with others, even more so in adversarial situations.

No need to drive because the car will get you there. No need to enter the destination because it already knows based on your previous behavioral patterns, calendar, searches, and other data points. We have not seen the full ramifications of this reality, but the technological conditions for this scenario are already feasible and available. What’s left?

As we disengage from manual tasks there is a lot more bandwidth to think, structure, plan, architect. But do we have the educational framework to make use of this new bandwidth in a positive way? Or will we use this extra bandwidth to consume more, worry more, I am curious to see how we will evolve emotionally, spiritually, socially and politically to keep up with the ever-increasing level of technological transformation.

I do approach it with optimism and recognize the positive transformation potential that AI brings but believe that our attitude, flexibility, and discipline are crucial towards developing a healthy relationship with this new world that AI is opening up.

Gabriel Fairman, CEO of Bureau Works 

Music has and will always be an important part of society as long as human beings exist. However, as society changes in many aspects, music also evolves to meet its new needs and demands. For quite a while now, AI has been a buzzword in the technology space. It is increasingly becoming a talk of almost every industry primarily due to its ability to offer automation services, ease responsibilities and offer innovative workflows. The entry of this new technology into the music industry is important due for a few reasons. Although to some it may sound like cheap science fiction, it is true that we can have robots capable of creating songs, playing music and AI-enhanced robots writing song lyrics. Such practices are not new in the music industry.

Since 1951, the music industry has been trying to leverage on AI. The first time when AI entered into the music industry began when Alan Turing, a computer scientist recorded computer-generated melodies. Although the recording was filled with various disturbances, it was an important step towards developing an AI-enabled music business. Nowadays, AI trains itself to analyze various composition types through reinforcement learning, an approach which is a massive improvement from the time of Alan Turing. Through learning continuously, this technology is capable of extracting the characteristics of a music thesis in its entirety. You might think that the ability of AI to compose different innovative pieces of music is a big achievement, but its ability to write lyrics is even cooler than you can imagine. By training AI models with a large number of datasets that contain random music lyrics and compositions, AI can easily write music lyrics and make compositions.

Although some people have ill-advised opinions about AI, thinking it will replace artists, the truth is actually the opposite. While some may see it as a threat to creativity and musicians, it can play a crucial role in the music business which may end up being highly advantageous; if properly applied of course. In fact, AI may help musicians and employees with their work. For example, as indicated by the early manifestations, AI can satisfy the ever-increasing demand for music and promote understanding of what listeners want. In the current big data era, AI can help musicians understand the music market, and in the process develop music that’s in demand and has the capacity to reach people who actually want to listen.

The experience of the listener is an area that has suffered. When it comes to the music audience, there are many ways in which their experiences can be enhanced and revolutionized altogether. With cutting-edge tech such as AI, live performances can be taken to the next level by the artist and in the end will enhance the listener’s experience. This increases the musicians’ chances of success. This technology has also made it easy for music streaming platforms to sell their music as the listeners can simply hum a song to find the artist who sang it. Similarly, AI and technology in general will bring a lot of difference in the music industry through education. With different technologies, music students have many tools which not only allow them to stay connected but also assure them of space for collaboration on different projects.

In summation, AI is changing the music industry making it easy for stakeholders in this sector to carry out various activities. As technology changes, it is expected that the music industry will change as well to allow listeners and viewers to experience the best that is made possible by technology.

Machine Learning has been developed under the umbrella term of ‘Artificial Intelligence’. Essentially, it’s set to change the way businesses operate as know it. It’s already been adopted across many industries including healthcare, law, education and retail.

Logistics companies and industrial business, in particular, are enjoying the benefits that machine learning and AI can bring to their efficiency and production. Perhaps one of the biggest businesses to adopt this new technology is the world’s largest e-commerce marketplace, Alibaba.

What Can Machine Learning and AI Bring to Warehouse Management?

For those industries that are truly open to embracing new developments in technology, machine learning and AI can be revolutionary. It effectively means that robots are able to take on tasks that would usually be assigned to humans. This kind of technology greatly improves the productivity of a business, as robots are able to complete tasks at a faster pace than humans. There’s also less margin for human error, such as a parcel being delivered to the wrong address, for example.

Furthermore, machine learning algorithms can be used to forecast demand. It’s proving to be far more effective than existing methods that had no way of calculating demand over time. This means that a warehouse would be better equipped for coping with busier periods such as Black Friday of Christmas.

How Has Alibaba Implemented It?

The Chinese company Alibaba has a total of $248 billion transactions – more than eBay and Amazon combined! So, it’s safe to say that any company as influential as Alibaba must be entirely confident in artificial intelligence in order to use it. They now have the world’s largest automated warehouse – whereby some 700 robots do all of the work. These robots pick out the stock to send to customers and are now responsible for 70% of the work in the warehouse. Alibaba now claims that because of this technology, it will be eventually delivered to anyone in China within 24 hours and 72 hours for internationally.

Additionally, the robots are able to carry up to 500 kilograms above them as they make their way around the warehouse. Every robot is fitted with sensors, so they avoid colliding with one another. They also include a Wi-Fi feature so they can be summoned at any time by the employees.

Supply Chain Management

For a huge company like Alibaba, supply chain management is crucial. Thanks to app developers, machine learning makes it possible to discover patterns in the chain using algorithms. The computer is able to analyse the existing chain and advise on which areas could be improved. Due to the nature of the computer, it’s also able to identify such flaws far quicker than manual intervention by an external assessor. Alibaba can then control inventory levels, production planning, quality and transport management.

The Future of Machine Learning in Warehouses

Alibaba is not the only business bringing automation to warehouses. Amazon and food delivery service Ocado also use robots to transport parcels around their fulfilment centres. With more and more investment being pumped into the technology, it’s likely that machine learning will be utilised more in warehouses and factories across the globe. Its potential to deliver additional value to businesses, and therefore customers, cannot be ignored. For this reason, machine learning and artificial intelligence are predicted to become an essential element in future supply chains.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is responsible for technological advancements affecting many diverse aspects of society. Most of this development is focused on achieving economic or social benefits for the world’s population. As is often the case with powerful tools, there are also individuals and groups that would use the capabilities of AI and the related field of machine learning (ML) for nefarious purposes. We will take a look at a few ways where this use of technology has led to new issues and concerns by cybersecurity professionals. 

Conducting Spear-Phishing Attacks

Spear-phishing is a widely used method of performing cyber attacks and the ability to automate these attacks can make them exponentially more dangerous. IBM’s development of a highly targeted and evasive attack tool called DeepLocker is powered by AI. The company purposely hid malware in a video conferencing application and had DeepLocker unlock the program when prompted by facial recognition of a specific individual. 

IBM designed DeepLocker to understand how AI and malware can be used for new types of spear-phishing attacks. Its success indicates that this technology in the wrong hands can be used to cause havoc in many unexpected and detrimental ways. 

Identifying System Vulnerabilities

The United States Department of Defense has purchased technology from a private company that possesses self-healing capabilities and is optimized to employ machine learning techniques to discover system vulnerabilities. While this particular piece of software is under government control, there are certainly similar tools being developed by cyber criminals with the intention of finding exploitable vulnerabilities in the systems that society depends on every day.

Software vulnerabilities have always been a prime target of hackers. By delegating the labor and time-intensive tasks of identifying weak points to AI-powered programs, the hackers can spend more time sharpening the weapons with which to take advantage of vulnerabilities found by their artificially intelligent tools.

Controlling Autonomous Vehicles

The potential to use AI and ML techniques to hack into autonomous vehicles is a concern that needs to be addressed before the wide adoption of these machines. The ability to fool the vision and collision avoidance systems of these vehicles could lead to catastrophic results as traffic signs are ignored or rules of the road disregarded. 

Consumer drones can be weaponized and controlled by an application that uses ML to continually update their ability to avoid capture. These techniques could lead to new types of terrorist attacks that will be much harder to detect and prevent.

Impersonating Individuals

The ability to use machine learning to impersonate individuals in various ways opens up new avenues through which cybercriminals can exploit their victims. The creation of fake voice recordings and videos using AI are making it increasingly hard to determine between reality and an impersonation.

Using impersonation techniques, one may be tricked into providing personal details that otherwise would never be made public. This can lead to compromised systems or accounts and can be extremely detrimental in many ways.

These are just a few of the ways that the technologies of AI and ML may be used with malicious purpose. Society must be aware of the double-edged potential of these disciplines to bestow benefits on society or cause significant harm.