Artificial Intelligence: Beyond the Hype

If there is one true indicator to measure the disruptiveness of a new technology, it's certainly the public outpouring of fear and suspicion. If we use societal angst as a measure, the current renaissance of artificial intelligence (AI) is a good candidate for groundbreaking technological disruption. AI will change life as we know it, as Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking and other great minds have told us. The widespread anxiety about the harmful consequences of AI applications is not an unparalleled reaction to technological change but rather an expression of the societal unease that commonly precedes the changes associated with new technologies and the vast potential that comes with them. We're looking beyond today's IoT, toward a future where smart connected devices not only talk with each other but where they use AI to interact with each other on our behalf.