The biggest evolution of Artificial Intelligence over the past two decades has been the maturation of deep learning as an approach to machine learning, the expansion of big data and the knowledge of how to operate big data systems effectively, and the inexpensive and available computing resources that can handle some of the most difficult development models of machine learning. Data scientists and machine learning engineers today now have a wide variety of options on how they create models to solve AI's different trends for their unique needs. However, for those looking to create machine learning models, the variety of options is actually part of the challenge. Too many options are just there. This, exacerbated by the fact that you can build a machine learning model in various ways, is the problem that many AI software vendors are doing a particularly poor job of explaining what their products actually do.

Regardless of the situation, it's human nature to be seeking out the next big thing. That is how we keep evolving as a species. We've even evolved in how we stay connected with each other from mail to telephones to computers. This shift in how we stay connected took a fascinating turn with the widespread adoption of the internet and artificial intelligence. In business, connectedness is everything.

My mother waited two months for her Amazon Echo to arrive. Then, she waited again -- leaving it in the box until I came to help her install it. Any device that requires vocal instructions makes my mother skeptical. She has bad memories of Siri. "She could not understand me," my mom told me.

My mother waited two months for her Amazon Echo to arrive. Then, she waited again -- leaving it in the box until I came to help her install it. Any device that requires vocal instructions makes my mother skeptical. She has bad memories of Siri. "She could not understand me," my mom told me.

If you happen to live in one of the six million US homes that have so far purchased an Amazon Echo, you may think Alexa is just a voice emanating from a cylindrical speaker that knows a couple of tricks. It plays the Beatles on command. It can order more toilet paper. It has jokes, some of which are even kind of funny. Just as Apple taught us that a small portable phone could be a more powerful computing method than our lumbering desktops, Amazon is introducing us to a new computing interface -- a voice devoid of a screen--that will eventually grow to be more ubiquitous and more useful than our smartphones.

If you happen to live in one of the six million US homes that have so far purchased an Amazon Echo, you may think Alexa is just a voice emanating from a cylindrical speaker that knows a couple of tricks. It plays the Beatles on command. It can order more toilet paper. It has jokes, some of which are even kind of funny. Just as Apple taught us that a small portable phone could be a more powerful computing method than our lumbering desktops, Amazon is introducing us to a new computing interface -- a voice devoid of a screen--that will eventually grow to be more ubiquitous and more useful than our smartphones.