by Angela Guess
TechCrunch contributor Larry Alton recently wrote, “Artificial intelligence (AI) is permeating our lives — just not in the ways we might have expected from reading sci-fi novels or watching robot apocalypse-themed movies. Instead of having live robots walking around, doing our dishes and engaging us in conversation, AI exists primarily in web and mobile apps designed to help us with small intellectual chores, like finding out when the Civil War began or where the nearest taco restaurant is located. Until recently, most of these AI developments have been designed to make consumer processes easier; for example, digital assistants take on the role of an intermediary search engine to process a vocal request and fetch appropriate results. Now, the trend is starting to shift toward app development — at least in an early stage.”
Alton goes on, “Rather than introducing a layer of AI to help users make use of a given app, these AI programs are operating in the background, making the apps better. They’re less glamorous than the human-like interactions programs like Siri that are capable of mimicking human speech patterns, but they’re even more useful — even if you never see them. Google is known in the search engine optimization community because of its frequent, manual algorithm updates that shake up rankings and frustrate webmasters. Now, its algorithm is starting to update itself.”
photo credit: Flickr/ Sean MacEntee