Putting deep learning to work

After demonstrating discontinuous jumps in image recognition performance and defeating Korean grandmaster Lee Se-dol at Go, a game long resistant to computer mastery, deep learning has kicked up a swirling cloud of hype. On the one hand, serious folks are studying how to prevent a recursively self-improving super intelligence from seizing Earth's reins from humanity. On the other, IBM's "cognitive" marketing claims are rightly being called out as hyperbolic. I think much of the excitement derives from the tremendous strides deep learning has recently made in processing less-structured input, like images and voice, that relate to the way we perceive the world. From a business perspective the challenge is to soberly assess the usefulness of new machine learning techniques for application in the near future.