Machine learning is the common basis for modern artificial intelligence, using large amounts of data to build AI models that recognize patterns and make predictions when presented with new information. A new Seattle startup led by a former Microsoft distinguished engineer uses a different approach: machine teaching. "It's not extracting knowledge from data; it's extracting knowledge from the person," explained Patrice Simard, CEO and co-founder of Intelus, who oversaw Microsoft research groups in areas including machine learning, databases, graphics, vision and cryptography in more than 20 years at the Redmond company. Intelus emerged from stealth mode Tuesday to launch an open beta of its new machine teaching platform, Duet, which offers a graphical user interface to create AI models from unstructured data without writing code or requiring advanced data science tools. The models can then be used to classify and extract data from text.