Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog

Category: business – Page 300

RLOL — headline alone is priceless. However, who does get blame? And, on what grounds? Negligence in the design of the product or bad product quality? What about improper application of the product because it was designed for a particular set of the population & not for a broader public use. What about the businesses using AI? Wonder what type of insurance & the amount of insurance a business would be will be required to have in place to utilize a robot cook, or robotic nurse, etc. Lots & lots of things that still require planning, restructuring, & budgeting.

Andy Rubin is best known as the creator of Android. But in 2014, he left that all behind to create his own startup called Playground, a company focused on financially backing futuristic ideas that will shape our world—hopefully for the better.

Today, Wired published a deeper look into Andy Rubin’s day-to-day at Playground, and it very well be responsible for the destruction of the human race. Now that Rubin is no longer at Google, he spends most of his time pondering and financially backing the future of artificial intelligence. You know, that technology that keeps some of the world’s greatest minds awake at night?

Read more

When is industry finally going to finally understand that the gap all along has been the lack of women leading NextGen Innovation especially around AI?

Here we go again trying to make AI more enriched. This time it is using a “dashcam” which again is a technique that is like living in a bubble looking at the world; meaning no true human experience or empathy programmed within AI. We must develop AI with an inside-out approach along with the outside-in approach; and not just an outside-in approach. And, it can be done because women understand this piece extremely well and can build AI to include this perspective because of how we interact and see the world.

Former Google exec and Android co-founder Andy Rubin has announced his latest designs for the tech industry — and his plans to take over what he considers the most important technological frontier of the decade: artificial intelligence.

Rubin laid out his latest tech endeavor, in an exclusive with Wired: a mission to more or less monopolize the artificial intelligence (AI) pocket of the market. While Rubin’s newest tech incubator Playground Global is the tech mogul’s gateway toward this endgame, it appears that the godfather of Android is only willing to concretely reveal one facet of his vision: a plan to create a visual traffic map with help from a free device and an unusual business model.

The big reveal came in the form of Playground’s dashcam hardware, accompanied by an unprecedented plan for the cam’s data. According to Rubin, the device would be given away to customers with one caveat: unhindered company access to each dash cam’s data set.

Read more

If Russia, China, etc. upgrades their infrastructure to Quantum before US and it’s does; today’s breaches will not even compare to this scenario.

The push to bring more technology-related businesses to the state has officials hoping for long-term growth over places like Fairfax County, Va., where the federal government has already made substantial technological investment.

After the ceremony, an expert panel discussed some of the opportunities and challenges facing information infrastructure, the importance of collaboration between the public and private sectors, and how to increase consumers’ cybersecurity confidence.

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker said during the panel that the current standing of federal cybersecurity has vastly improved since she was appointed to the post in 2013 — but there is still a ways to go.

Read more

Danaher’s Instruments of Change — If you feel like your industry that has always been on a slow & stable growth curve is now under greater pressure to change; you’re not alone. Recent indicators are showing with the latest changes in tech and consumers (namely the millennials as the largest consumers today); industries have been shaken up to perform at new levels like never before or companies in those industries will cease to be relevant.

Doing well by doing good is now expected for businesses, and moral leadership is at a premium for CEOs. For today’s companies to maintain their license to operate, they need to take into account a range of elements in their decision making: managing their supply chains, applying new ways of measuring their business performance that include indicators for social as well as commercial returns, and controlling the full life cycle of their products’ usage as well as disposal. This new reality is demonstrated by the launch last September of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which call on businesses to address sustainability challenges such as poverty, gender equality, and climate change in new and creative ways. The new expectations for business also are at the heart of the Change the World list, launched by Fortune Magazine in August 2015, which is designed to identify and celebrate companies that have made significant progress in addressing major social problems as a part of their core business strategy.

Technology and millennials seem to be driving much of this change. Socially conscious customers and idealistic employees are applauding companies’ ability to do good as part of their profit-making strategy. With social media capable of reaching millions instantly, companies want to be on the right side of capitalism’s power. This is good news for society. Corporate venturing activities are emerging, and companies are increasingly leveraging people, ideas, technology, and business assets to achieve social and environmental priorities together with financial profit. These new venturing strategies are focusing more and more on areas where new partnerships and investments can lead to positive outcomes for all: the shareholders, the workers, the environment, and the local community.

Furthermore, this is especially true in the technology sector. More than 25% of the Change the World companies listed by Fortune are tech companies, and four are in the top ten–Vodafone, Google, Cisco Systems, and Facebook. Facebook’s billionaire co-founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and his wife have helped propel the technology sector into the spotlight as a shining beacon of how to do good and do well. Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan pledged on December 1, 2015, to give 99 percent of their fortune to charity. Facebook shares are valued between $40 and $45 billion, which makes this a very large gift. The donations will initially be focused on personalized learning, curing disease, connecting people, and building strong communities.

Read more

Another discussion on Quantum Entanglement. I am seeing a huge gap for scientists and technologists in explaining Quantum to every day folks especially in business. If order for business, etc. to adopt Quantum we will need to start explaining Quantum in examples that the average person can understand.

When physicist Ronald Hanson revealed shocking evidence for quantum entanglement, the world took note — the universe really is stranger than fiction, as he reveals in this hangout with cryptographer Renato Renner.

Read more

A new thriller starring Ben Kingsley and Ryan Reynolds explores the idea of transferring consciousness from one body to another. Unlike Freaky Friday, or the myriad of other family movies and comedies that have explored the idea, this one actually explores the science of the process.

In the movie Self/less, a rich business man (Kingsley) is dying of cancer. However, he is able to prolong his “self” by transferring his consciousness from one body to another using a medical procedure called “shedding.”

You may be wondering how such a far-out concept can actually have any science to it. I wondered the same thing, so I asked a neuroscientist what he thought.

Read more

Brand’s view and concerns about hacking driverless cars are valid. And, I do believe in time that government will eventually catch up in passing some laws that will make companies ensure that their technology is safe for consumer usage and are safe for the public. I just hope that the pendulum does swing too far to the other side of over regulation.

It is not easy to slot Brad Templeton. What do you make of a person who is not only the networks and computing chair at Singularity University in Silicon Valley but also a software architect, a director of the Foresight Nanotech Institute, board member of the cyberspace watchdog Electronic Frontier Foundation, the first person to have set up an Internet-based business, a futurist lecturer, hobby photographer, artist, as well as a consultant on Google’s driverless car design team?

In a phone interview from the US, Templeton, who will be in India this month as a key speaker during the SingularityU India Summit (to be held in association with INK, which hosts events like INKtalks—a platform for the exchange of cutting-edge ideas and inspiring stories), shared his views on driverless cars, the perceived threat from intelligent machines and censorship of the Internet. Edited excerpts:

Driverless cars are not hacker-proof and may find it difficult to navigate chaotic traffic. How are we addressing such issues?

It’s absolutely true that people are concerned about security of these cars, but it is wrong to presume that people in the media learnt about this before those who built the driverless car. The people who built the car are working to make the car secure. They won’t be able to do it perfectly, but they are going to get there. The Google team certainly has the most miles to its credit. Right now over 2 million km in automatic mode, driving around mostly in California. The chaotic driving in India is slower than some of the roads in Europe or North America. And it is actually easier to do slower and chaotic driving than faster. You get more time to stop, perceive the situation and make accurate moves. The real challenge is that in many chaotic driving situations, there are unwritten rules so you have to figure out how to sort of, play a game with the other cars. It may mean that some of the more chaotic places may have to clean up their act a bit if they want to have a technology like this.

Read more

Interesting article, and one thing that I have thoroughly enjoyed over the years is helping companies developed new products and services through innovation, or changing their IT organization into real profit centers like this article highlights. And, as part of these types of transformations it has always been key to change/ reinforce the culture’s mindset that business owns the definition of the strategies and solutions.

However, as AI becomes more and more prevelant across businesses; we could eventually see that IT ends up owning the definition as well as the enablement of the solutions for the company/ business. So, it is almost like we come full circle through AI after all. And, this is just one of many business/ corporate cultural questions that we will need to address with AI in the coming years.

There are many reasons to run IT as a well functioning business instead of the traditional cost center model. Below are the top 5 consequences of continuing to run IT in the traditional manner.

Wasted Resources

Running IT as a cost center actually can result in waste of precious company resources. Both money and time can be used more effectively if the department is run in a more business like manner. Money is wasted through duplication of efforts, maintaining systems that should be replaced, failed projects, and systems and data centers that do not meet the business needs. The most precious resource of time is wasted in both IT departments and throughout the company. Poorly run projects that run over time or do not provide full value impact everyone. Business departments also spend time working around IT instead of with it resulting in wasted time. Running IT as a business helps ensure that time and money are used in the most effective manner to help the business meet it objectives.

Read more

Moley Chef Robots reappearing again today across the web. These do hold a lot of opportunity for restaurant franchises as well as homes. However, AI in a business has a break even point before the investment is no longer a wise or sound investment.

Always step back and look at the bigger picture 1st (e.g. look at all costs & any risks/ liabilities). Look at initial purchase/ lease costs, any write off/ depreciation opportunities, know your customer & your brand (if your restaurant is because of your master chef then a robot is a line chef which you consider how much your spending on a line chef as well as replacing them v. a robotic chef), know your local food & safety regs. Never good to put in a series of robotic chefs and local ordinances and city committees pass restrictions that forces you to de-install your $60K robot after 1 or 2 yrs.

Moley Robotics is the company behind creating an electronic chef that mimics the hand movements of actual cooks.

Read more