Doctors, AI, the Information Age, and You

Quick.

You have a situation.  There are a set of measurable indicators the most common of which are easy to take.  Various levels or markers of each measurement point to a likely culprit and solution. The size of the data set that must be factored in is enormous, well beyond the ability of the human mind to hold all at once.

How should this be handled?

If this isn't the perfect situation for computers and Artificial Intelligence I don't know what is.

Are we talking about Amazon.com and their amazing ability to mine datasets to sell more stuff to you?  Or are we talking about medicine?

I was an Emergency Room medic in another lifetime with the United States Air Force so I have some understanding of this.  I've been a believer for many years that we need far more computer algorithm medicine and far less human emotion involved.  I've seen it first hand.  That is the premise of this article. 

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Former Google China president Kai-Fu Lee is betting heavily on artificial intelligence...
“If we look at what AI cannot do, there are really two main things,” Lee said on the latest episode of Recode Decode, hosted by Kara Swisher. “One is creative jobs. Jobs like scientists, storytellers, artists and so on. And the other are the compassionate people who really have created a human-to-human connection, trust.”

And what about the jobs that require low creativity and compassion?

“All those jobs will be taken by AI,” he said.

Here is the full article:

https://www.recode.net/2018/9/17/17867990/kai-fu-lee-ai-superpowers-book-artificial-intelligence-jobs-doctors-kara-swisher-decode-podcast

Will the IBM Watson doctors be there for your next medical appointment?  Not yet.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Big Data Coupons as you Drive

The era of big data is upon us as techies around the world scramble to figure out the best ways to use all of that data floating out there (with much more data still to come as the Internet of Things grows).

A startup has figured out how to hit you with coupons on the fly, in a relevant way, and has some major retailers interested.  Here is the story:

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/blog/techflash/2015/08/startup-hopes-to-push-shopping-offers-to-you-while.html

Here is a snippet from that piece:

Repeat entrepreneur Sanjay Chopra and Eric Nyberg, professor at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science, have teamed on an ecommerce startup that will use mobile data to create personalized shopping offers.

Cognistx, which is based in Gibsonia, launched in July and expects to debut its first product in early fall. Via language processing and data manipulation, the young mobile marketing firm enables retailers to offer personalized offers to customers, Chopra said. That includes their history with the retailer and to-the-minute information such as their location. Nyberg had consulted with IBM on the Watson project, the supercomputer that won on “Jeopardy!” four years ago.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

A Simple Question

I'm just going to ask this.  Not certain of the answer but I want to post this anyway.

If A equals B and B equals C then A also equals C right?

For the more mathematical:

If A=B
And B=C
Then A=C

Well if Apple is working with IBM and IBM is working with Monitise then is it possible Apple is also working with Monitise?  What would that mean for retail, mobile payments, wallet, and more?

I don't know if any of that is happening but I wanted to ask the question.  The public statement around the IBM and Apple relationship is a focus on Enterprise solutions and that made quite a stir.  What if there is more going on behind the scenes?

Here is an article on Apple's link to IBM:

http://www.networkworld.com/article/2456690/uc-voip/apple-ibm-agreement-shows-progress-for-enterprise-mobility.html

Here is an article on IBM's link to Monitise:

http://www.itproportal.com/2014/07/23/ibm-and-monitise-cloud-based-mobile-payment-solution-ready-to-trigger-retail-revolution/

What will happen next?  I don't know.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Apple in the News - Payments and Enterprise with IBM

A couple of big stories involving Apple came to light over the last 24 hours.

First up is a very interesting move in to digital payments, currently exclusively in Japan.

http://www.paymentssource.com/news/emerging-payments/apple-lays-foundation-for-digital-payments-in-japan-3018532-1.html

Here is a snippet from that piece:

ITunes Pass is the latest of many small steps Apple has made that could be combined to enable mobile commerce, contactless payments and a mobile wallet. And the company boasted in April that most of its 800 million iTunes accounts have credit cards already attached. But its Passbook app, a wallet that houses other apps, has mostly been a sandbox for third parties.

"It would seem with this move Apple is boiling the proverbial frog. It's a small, yet significant move that slowly transitions Passbook from a digital storage container to a digital wallet," says Jordan McKee, a senior analyst covering mobile payments at 451 Research Mobility Team.

Next is the announcement of a close partnership between Apple and IBM for the Enterprise.

http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/15/apple-teams-up-with-ibm-for-huge-expansive-enterprise-push/

Here is a snippet from that piece:

Apple has announced a strategic partnership with IBM that will see the enterprise giant transfer over 150 of their enterprise and IT apps and tools to Apple platforms natively, and will also have IBM selling Apple iPhones and iPads to its business clients all over the world. In an interview with CNBC, Apple CEO Tim Cook and IBM CEO Virginia Rometty both told the network that Apple and IBM are like “puzzle pieces” that fit perfectly together.

“We knew that we needed to have a partner that deeply understood each of the verticals,” Cook told CNBC. “That had scale, that had a lot of dirt under their fingernails so to speak from really understanding each of these verticals and we found a kindred spirit in IBM.”

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

**UPDATE** iTunes Pass is now available in the USA and UK.
http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/itunes-pass-mobile-payments-japan/#!bg2GTN

**UPDATE #2** A bit more analysis on Apple's moves towards a mobile wallet
http://www.pymnts.com/news/acquiring/2014/coming-this-fall-apples-mwallet/#.U9ELS-NdX9Y