Artificial Intelligence (AI) was born at a workshop organized by John McCarthy in 1956 at Dartmouth. Ever since, AI has been a branch of computer science that studies the properties of intelligence and aims to synthesize it. Over the past 60 years, the field has seen at least 4 peaks and troughs (called "winters") of interest and sponsorship. During much of this time, researchers in the field have been stymied not only by the lack of funding, but by the lack of data, hardware and algorithms. In the last 5 years, however, all this has changed.

A recent post highlighted how artificial intelligence (AI) is already playing important roles in health care, and concluded that expanded use of AI may be ready for us before we are ready for it. One example of the kind of problem we'll face is: who would we sue if care that an AI recommended or performed went wrong? Because, you know, always follow the money. Last week Stanford's One Hundred Year Study On Artificial Intelligence released its 2016 report, looking at the progress and potential of AI, as well as some recommendations for public policy. The report urged that we be cautious about both too little regulation and too much, as the former could lead to undesirable consequences and the latter could stifle innovation.

The field of artificial intelligence got its start at a conference at Dartmouth in 1956. Optimism ran high and it was believed that machines would be able to do the work of humans within 20 years. Alas, it was not to be. By the 1970's, funding dried up and the technology entered the period known as the AI winter. Clearly, much has changed since then.

Artificial intelligence is already an effective marketing tool in large-scale marketing channels, but recently it has made headway in mobile video advertising. A recent survey of 1,000 mobile users asked if after watching a mobile video ad whether viewers were inclined to buy a product. Nearly half of those surveyed said they never bought a product after watching a commercial video. Additionally, when asked why this was the case, 51 per cent stated they were not in the market for the product at that time of viewing and 29 per cent said the adverts were not relevant. These statistics for mobile video viewers indicated that advertising is not being delivered at the correct point in the purchase funnel or to users who were likely to change their minds, ultimately wasting marketer's budgets. "The challenge many brands face is getting ROI from their digital campaigns and achieving the marketing goals" comments Stephen Upstone, CEO LoopMe.

Satya Nadella said Microsoft is building the world's most powerful artificial intelligence supercomputer.

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On Sept. 19, Etsy (NASDAQ:ETSY) announced it had acquired private analytics and AI company Blackbird Technologies to enhance its search capabilities. Since Etsy is an online retailer of rare products and handmade crafts, though, some might question the prudence of its purchase. Etsy bought Blackbird Technologies for an undisclosed sum of money. What we do know is what the company gets in the exchange: Blackbird's analytics engine that analyzes shoppers' behavior to predict and suggest personalized search results, image recognition and cataloguing to enhance user searches, and spelling correction and predictive type to speed up the search process. In addition to the technology, the techie team at Blackbird will also be joining Etsy, including the two company co-founders.

Google had more fun at the expense of Apple, poking fun at its South Bay neighbor by announcing Pixel comes in three colors -- quite black, very silver and really blue.

While the South African market has become more aware of machine learning – as well as its capabilities and the value it can add to a business – machine learning uptake and local industry development lags behind several developed markets (not by months, but years). This is according to DataProphet MD Frans Cronje who highlights that tertiary courses promoting machine learning have only recently become available in South Africa. "It will therefore take time to develop the talent required to'catch up' with competing markets such as the United States," he says. As a subset of artificial intelligence which explores the development of algorithms that learn from available data, machine learning is the science of getting computers to act without being explicitly programmed. Having been in the market for more than two years and with a growing team specialising in producing bleeding-edge machine learning solutions, DataProphet is one of the most well-established companies purely focused on developing and implementing machine learning solutions in the country.

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