Getting Started with Artificial Intelligence

Start collecting data.  If you want to be part of the AI revolution sweeping the business world, you’ll have to have data.  If you’ve already got the data, drop it into something like BigML and start asking questions.  Those insights today in a session put on by the Transatlantic AI eXchange hosted by Thomas Neubert.

“Demystifying AI - How any Business Can get Started with Machine Learning / AI” brought together Greg LaBlac at the University of California’s Haas School of Business and David Carmona, a General Manager at Microsoft.  It was a powerful discussion with important insights that the TAIX will share in a recording.  But I will share with you some key points I picked up in the session.

For one, Artificial Intelligence is already here and is being used in everyday business.  It’s not a “shiny black box” that people go to for answers. It’s NOT the evil robot that is romanticized in the media, including movies.  AI is here now in Internet search, recommendations you get on shopping sites, the cars we drive and the responses when we ask Siri or Alexa a question.  The message in the session today is that AI is available now and it can help you. So, jump in.

What can AI do?

Next, what’s something AI can do?  Well, the biggest failure business people make is understanding the granularity of their decisions.  LaBlanc shared this insight.  He talked about how business managers may look at their decisions as being good ones or bad ones; decisions that work and those that don’t.  But the reality is that the decisions one makes set in motion a whole series of events. Understanding this and then analyzing how those events play out can provide data which then can be used in Machine Learning to show what worked or how things went wrong.

This is where the picture I show here comes in.  LaBlanc shared this slide and talked about how a business unexpectedly found which job applicants were most likely to stick with the company.  You see it here.  Those using Chrome or Firefox web browsers turned out to be the better employee.  This sounds rather random, but it’s a great example of what having data and then using AI to analyze it can find, things that can escape an analysis done by using only the human mind.

There’s much, much more in this session, a recording of which will be made available on TAIX, but other takeaways include:  There’s a revolution in no-code or low-code AI in which you can drop your data into new Machine Learning platforms like BigML and start asking questions of your data without needing to know how to program in Python or R.  Also, if you’re looking to transform your business, make sure everybody is participating, not just those in the technology or IT department.  Start thinking of yourself as an AI company.

More than a moon shot!  

NASA's launch of Artimus marks a milestone in space exploration. This is simply because the initial mission, just to put people in a capsule around the moon, may end up making history. That's due to the fact they might end up the farthest from earth than man has ever been. This will depend on the position of the moon on that initial shot. But there's much more to understand than just flying astronauts around Earth's closest neighbor.

You see, the moon will be a launching pad for a manned mission to Mars. This is possible because of water. Yes, you probably know that we've already discovered water on the moon. Water contains both oxygen and hydrogen. Oxygen obviously can be used for us to breethe while hydrogen can be used for fuel. And keep in mind that just the water itself is important for life, human and otherwise. If you think this is all out of reach given the complexity of carrying out such an endeavor, read on.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning have already led to great advances in autonomous vehicles and robotics. Don't think for a moment these won't be applied to our latest mission to the moon. In fact, we stand to be able to do things we could have only dreamed of back in the Apollo era in the late 1960s and early 70s. Manufacturing with the use of robotics is old hat nowadays, and now we have machines that can pretty much think for themselves. Don't be afraid to dream a bit more, because advances of mythic proportions are now about to become reality.

AI and ML in Space

In discussing AI and ML with the first person to get a computer to recognize human speech, the conversation drifted to the concept of machines being able to reach the level of consciousness. The subject came up in earnest a few years ago and the prediction was this would happen by sometime in the late 2020s. Yes, we are still on track for that phenomenal advancement in science. This makes the moon shot so much more exciting.

Don't get lost in the fact exploration of space and planetary objects can be done just with robotics. Think personal assistants. They are on the immediate horizon for us here on Earth. It's not a very far leap from there to using them in space. As difficult as space exploration now is for humans, it's going to get easier. With machines doing most of the heavy lifting, we'll be in a much better position to do the real exploring. It's time to think big, think beyond a moon shot.

(Picture Credit: Andrew McCarthy and Connor Matherne collaborated last November to push their photography skills to the limit. Their finished product was posted online Saturday, and is currently gaining lots of attention on Reddit. See link in "moon shot.")

 Venture Capital - What's in Store

By Henry Mulak

If you are a venture capitalist you are not going stop investing, even in what appears to be a pending economic slowdown.  At least that’s according to the four investors who took part in a panel discussion put on by the German American Business Association.  The message could be taken as good news for startups looking for funding.  Suggestions for what’s hot included fintech, cybersecurity, anything involving Artificial Intelligence that helps with things like human resources and inventory as well ideas that will save on labor costs.

GABA invited the four VC leaders to its annual VC Capital Investment Thesis, offering participants a chance to hear “what’s hot and what’s not.”  Ankita Vashistha, a partner at StrongHer Ventures who helped lead the Saha Fund and Thorns Capital offered cybersecurity as one of her top interests for 2022.  “We can work from anywhere.  Talent can work from anywhere.”  So, tools and infrastructure are hot right now and so startups offering help with security stand a good chance of attracting new funding.

Cybersecurity is also one of Steve Goldberg’s top pics for funding.  The partner at Finistere Ventures told the group anything cybersecurity related is a good bet for funding.  “Things are tough right now,” he says, but VCs are ready to invest because “businesses still need to run” even in an economic downturn.  He points to AI enhancements to standard enterprise software involving human resources or inventory are a good bet for his company.

Point72 Ventures Operating Partner Eva-Maria Olbers says 2021 was a very unusual year, pointing to VC funding that was off the charts.  She sees “a more natural and more sustainable trend” emerging in 2022.  What’s more, investing will continue.  “VCs will always be looking for avenues and for investments,” she said.  With the world opening up as the pandemic wanes, she is optimistic, in part because “we are getting to meet our founders in person.”

The economy is definitely slowing according to Martin Tantow, a partner at the behemoth VC firm Pegasus Tech Ventures.  He brought a “high-level view” to the panel, saying there was a significant downturn in evaluations in the first quarter of the year after the highest valuations ever at the end of 2021.  He’s seeing continued downward pressure in the second quarter, but “the best startups get started in downturns.  This coming downturn is not a negative thing.”

“If you have a good idea, go for it” says Goldberg.  The other panelists seemed to all agree, including Olbers who says, “Overall, an optimistic lens going forward.”  Part of the issue here is that venture funds are typically 10-years long and longer.  A downturn lasts only so long, Goldberg says, and with investment periods lasting three years “there’s no way to stop investments and wait for things to change.”  

The author:  Henry Mulak is a journalist and teacher working out of Silicon Valley.  A member of GABA since 2018, he has worked from both Germany and California over a career spanning four decades.  He moved from Berlin back to his home state in 2013 and now focuses on the tech sector, including AI and Machine Learning.

 The Night of the Blood Red Moon

A recurring nightmare.  I wish it was a dream.  It’s not.  It’s as real as the moon you see here.  The total lunar eclipse shown over the United States on Sunday night.  The total lunar eclipse shown just after midnight back east, but for the rest of us it was still Sunday.  I went out from the newsroom into our parking lot here in Silicon Valley to take the picture just after 9 p.m.  Was it serendipity?  Was it lost on everyone else on this night of the blood-red moon.

Mass Shootings & Mass Murder

We struggled to cover them all, struggle as we do to cover the news.  I don’t know that we explain to our audience, to our readers, to the public what it’s like to cover the news.  I know.  I see it.  I see it not only from the inside but from outside as well.  I work to monitor other media every working day.  I was surprised on this particular night.  The coverage seemed so incomplete.  What a disappointment knowing we just can’t keep up with them all.

Saturday’s massacre in Buffalo, New York is a case when a story transcends all the filters we place on our coverage at my local station.  Working locally, we focus on what’s going on in our immediate market.  But this one ranks as an international story, not just national.  The question is one of what we have become as a nation.  But the story was incomplete.  We needed a thread and needle to link them all.  Buffalo was but one.  By Sunday night the story had also become one of a church in Southern California, the violence in Wisconsin after a Bucks playoff game, and whatever happened in Houston.  All deadly.  All mass shootings.

There may have been more than four mass shootings on this particular weekend, the weekend with the night of the blood-red moon.  I feel pretty confident I was on top of what was going on.  I do that as part of my job and I think I do it well.  My frustration boiled over into anger when I saw the late night news on so many outlets, the coverage I monitor so closely to make sure my news department misses nothing.  Why didn’t everyone mention all the killing, all the shooting, all the death?  Was it just too much; too much to keep track of; too much to consider; too overwhelming for those “covering” the news?

One of my friends, a fellow journalist I’ve known for decades, suffers from PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome suffered in a mass shooting in Los Angeles many years back.  I see how it affected him.  I think of all the bodies I’ve seen over my long and illustrious career, but nothing like what he saw that day when robbers came ready to do their deadly deed, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons.  I wonder what my life would be like if I had been so unfortunate, unlucky enough in one of my many assignments to cover such a crime.

By now, you must be expecting some sort of conclusion here to this story.  I’m afraid I don’t see any conclusion to this.  There’s nothing on the horizon that shows anything I might consider as an end, a solution, an outcome.  One thing I do know, one thing I am aware of, is that I’ll be covering at least two elections before the year is over.  Therein lies something I can never know what to expect.  I think back to November of 2016 and the shock everyone seemed to feel at the outcome.  Maybe after November we’ll know, I’ll know, what we have become.