From winning Jeopardy in 2011 to helping write a sad song last year, IBM's Watson cognitive computing platform is all over popular culture. Press releases fly out about Watson producing a movie trailer, powering a Macy's shopping app, even controlling lights on an internet-connected dress -- along with more serious applications like working on cancer treatments. It seems, from IBM's hype, that Watson can do everything. But Bernie Meyerson, IBM's chief innovation officer, wants to dial back the hype in some ways, calling Watson "just the first step on a very, very long road." Watson can be helpful in a lot of industries, such as medicine, which are awash in data, but it can't replace people, he says.

From winning Jeopardy in 2011 to helping write a sad song last year, IBM's Watson cognitive computing platform is all over popular culture. Press releases fly out about Watson producing a movie trailer, powering a Macy's shopping app, even controlling lights on an internet-connected dress--along with more serious applications like working on cancer treatments. It seems, from IBM's hype, that Watson can do everything. But Bernie Meyerson, IBM's chief innovation officer, wants to dial back the hype in some ways, calling Watson "just the first step on a very, very long road." Watson can be helpful in a lot of industries, such as medicine, which are awash in data, but it can't replace people, he says.

Three years ago, I decided to learn how to code. A large part of the reason why I decided to embark on a career in tech was to empower myself with the ability to create an application, thereby providing value to society. I was reminded once again why I chose to go down this route during IBM Chairman, President and CEO Ginni Rometty's opening presentation at the Watson Developer Conference in San Francisco this November. Rometty invited Joshua Browder, a 19 year-old student at Stanford and co-founder of DoNotPay, and Ashok Goel, professor of computer science at Georgia Institute of Technology, on stage with her. Browder was there to talk about the DoNotPay application he created.

IBM Chief Executive Ginni Rometty (above) announced that its cognitive computing services already reach 200 million people worldwide and would reach 1 billion by the end of 2017. Healthcare and consumers are proving especially ripe targets for Watson. IBM will continue to engage data scientists, but it indicated that increasingly it will turn its attention to reaching developers. It aims to reach those developers by making Watson's machine learning tools and services as easy-to-use and cost-effective as renting cloud virtual machines. IBM Chief Executive Ginni Rometty (above) announced that its cognitive computing services already reach 200 million people worldwide and would reach 1 billion by the end of 2017.

Earlier this year, David Kenny, from IBM Watson, took to the SDC Keynote stage to share how they've been working to help people better understand machine, and help machines better understand us. Their APKs take data patterns and turn them into algorithms allowing developers to take those algorithms and turn them into life-changing experiences. Watson developers have created really great experiences – just look back at the TechCrunch Disrupt hackathon winners. Next week, at Watson Developer Conference, hundreds of developers will join industry leading experts like Uber, Slack, Cyber Code Twins and Omni Earth, to talk about best practices in machine learning and cognitive methodology to create knowledge from both internal and external data. This is a MUST ATTEND event for anyone interested in AI.

IBM will hold its first-ever conference for developers who are making bots and virtual assistants with IBM Watson. Part of the Watson Developer Conference will be two bot competitions. One competition is for a bot to get people around the conference. The other asks developers to create bots that speak to other bots. For funzies, said IBM developer evangelist Zachary Walchuk.