Amazon launches cost-cutting review focusing on Alexa

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by andyh2000

There's a tendency in AI that as soon as computers become able to do something that previously only humans could do, it no longer counts as intelligence. Playing chess, recognising images etc. Sure, we don't have artificial general intelligence yet but tell someone 20 years ago that you'd be able to speak in natural language to a computer, asking it general knowledge questions, and it would provide useful answers; well, I think they'd have called that intelligence.

Andrew

No, the Chess and other Computer successes don't do it like we do. It's brute force examining many options and giant databases.

And the speaking and getting clever answers is a lie, depending on 1000s of cheap human workers.

Watson Health system was nothing to do with how Watson won Jeopardy. It was a failure.

We used to think brain size was important. Makes no difference to humans and Dolphins may be no "smarter" than dogs or horses. Rooks & many other crows might be "smarter" than chimps, dogs or dolphins.

Also many animals can learn a large vocabulary (with some crows and maybe even British starling as able to say words as grey parrots) and correctly connect words or symbols or sign language, but not one verified case of actual language. Some people are quite angry with Noam Chomsky's ideas on human language.

People too easily anthropomorphize animal behaviour or deterministic computer programs like chat bots. See Eliza, ALICE and all the current online ones. The more convincing ones are not much better than Eliza, just more rules and bigger database.

People misunderstand the Turing Test. Turing's suggestion wasn't that it would prove AI if passed, but that it should be possible and it would not indicate real or hard AI.

Today AI is a marketing term that's replaced Expert Systems. Computer Translation goal was once true grammar. Google abandoned that. They started with EU texts, the same things in different languages. Google Translate is sort of OK to your own language, but it's not much better than programs 20 years ago. It's a database with phrase and word matching. A giant Rosetta stone. Machine Learning is nothing of the sort. It's human curated data fed to the multi-level pattern matching database. Computer Neural Networks are a kind of data-flow pattern matching (not recognition) and are nothing to do with biological neural systems. Marketing lingo.

Both "The Diamond Age" and "The Ensorcelled Maid" examine the fake nature of AI today.

[andyh2000]

Originally Posted by Quoth

...
Computer Neural Networks are a kind of data-flow pattern matching (not recognition) and are nothing to do with biological neural systems. Marketing lingo.
...

So you're saying that the neural networks in certain kinds of machine learning applications aren't networks of nodes with connections between them, and the connections don't get reinforced by 'right' answers during a training phase? Much like we currently think neurons and synapses in brains work? I must be reading this article completely incorrectly then: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network

How else do our brains work other than by pattern matching against stuff stored during a (life-long, ongoing) learning phase?

Edited to add - also who cares if machines don't do things the same way we do. Aeroplanes don't flap their wings but we still say they fly.

Andrew

[John F]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I don't understand your hobby horse on this. So it's not HAL-9000. Who cares? If it does what the end user wants, that is good enough.



I like my Google Home speakers ...

...

+1

I'm in the Amazon garden, and find it very useful. With my elderly parents, it has been a big help: From TV control, to having a simple button they can press so I can get a notification on my phone so I can get outside and do some yard work, to turning on the christmas lights, ...

I don't expect perfection, and it can be frustrating when it doesn't work, but I've come to appreciate Alexa, warts and all.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Today AI is a marketing term that's replaced Expert Systems. Computer Translation goal was once true grammar. Google abandoned that. They started with EU texts, the same things in different languages. Google Translate is sort of OK to your own language, but it's not much better than programs 20 years ago. It's a database with phrase and word matching. A giant Rosetta stone. Machine Learning is nothing of the sort. It's human curated data fed to the multi-level pattern matching database. Computer Neural Networks are a kind of data-flow pattern matching (not recognition) and are nothing to do with biological neural systems. Marketing lingo.

Who cares? Everything becomes a marketing term (that's technically incorrect) at some point. The sanctity of the definition of A.I. simply isn't a hill worth dying on. Move on.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I just get a header with name, disabled printer icon Sign In and a spinner in the middle of the page. Maybe it now only works with Chrome based browsers? I even disabled script blocking entirely.

Maybe you have to Sign In?

Edit: It does load in Chromium, not in any other browser. But only reading on screen, no download to read on big 10" eink or off-line.

I think I can change that, but it's probably not worth the trouble for something like this. And (in the U.S.) it works fine in Firefox. (At least it comes in fine, I would have to reset the permissions for downloads.)

At any rate I thought it just kind of fit the general drift of this thread.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Who cares? Everything becomes a marketing term (that's technically incorrect) at some point. The sanctity of the definition of A.I. simply isn't a hill worth dying on. Move on.

I just did a quick glance at the Echo page on the Amazon site, did a search for "a.i.", and didn't gdt any matches. Someone's Tilting at windmills.

[haertig]

Why would anyone care if Alexa is "real AI" (per their personal definition) or not?

I can ask what time it is. I can set multiple timers while cooking. I can set an alarm to wake me up in the morning. I can turn my household lights on and off. I can tell my sprinkler system to water a zone that is looking dry. I can add items to my shopping list. I can ask what the weather will be. I can converse with others in different rooms. I can ask the current score of a hockey game, or I can ask what channel it's being broadcast on. I can ask what the best temperature is for baking salmon. I can dim the lights while sitting on the couch watching a movie. I can be watching reruns and ask, "Alexa, is Dick Van Dyke still alive?" I can tell it to connect to my large bluetooth speakers and play Christmas music. I get notified as soon as Amazon drops off a package at my door so I can go get it before some porch pirate does.

I don't care if this is "real AI" per someone else's definition, or if it's Bob and Cindy at Amazon sitting at their laptops typing really fast to get me the info I want.

One fantastic use of Alexa is for those of us who have aging parents that have dementia. Before my mom died, I used this to converse with her in her memory care facility. She had forgotten how to use a telephone, but she could still speak out "Alexa, call David" and seconds later I'd answer this automatically placed call to my cellphone and she'd hear me on her Alexa speakerphone. And I could contact her by saying "Alexa, drop in on mom" and she'd hear me come in over Alexa's speakerphone without her having to answer or acknowledge or anything. This cross-town hands-free voice-controlled intercom that could even dial me on my cellphone was a Godsend. I was so glad to have this capability, even if some don't consider it to be "real AI". It solved a tough problem. Beautifully.

[shanghaichica]

I think Amazon’s problem is that they have too many sales in their devices. It makes it hard for anyone to pay full retail price when they know they can get it significantly cheaper in a sale and sales happens so frequently. I have a lot of echo devices and kindles. Apart from my echo show 15 and kindle scribe I bought all of the others when they were on sale at a significantly cheaper price. The only reason I likely bought the other devices as full price was because they were new products that I bought at launch and I didn’t want to wait to for them to go on sale.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by haertig

One fantastic use of Alexa is for those of us who have aging parents that have dementia. Before my mom died, I used this to converse with her in her memory care facility. She had forgotten how to use a telephone, but she could still speak out "Alexa, call David" and seconds later I'd answer this automatically placed call to my cellphone and she'd hear me on her Alexa speakerphone. And I could contact her by saying "Alexa, drop in on mom" and

No, it's abusive and my mother couldn't have used it. My sister (using 3G on her iPad) and later the care home provided Viber (secure & private and on Mac, Windows, Linux, iOS and Android, owned by Rakuten, same as Kobo is). Chat & video.
She needed the video. She died from dementia this year, almost 90.
Earlier she had labelled "speed dial" buttons on her landline phone.
The last time I met her she'd moved to my sister's house (about 2 days before hospital and then after to care home) she knew what the phone was for but didn't know which way up to hold it. My dad would never have used Alexa. He did use email up to about a year before he died and Kindle till last week as well as landline phone. He wasn't interested in using a mobile. He was over 90 when he died.

Either Alexa will become dumber only answering/doing already programmed stuff, or be shut down. The current version needs too many people. It also is inefficient in energy use (servers + internet) compared to speech tools in a local device (it's called speech recognition, but it's pattern matching).

Sticking head in sand and refusing to admit this not a real implementation of SF, but a fraud and serious issue of privacy, especially in countries with deficient consumer protection (Amazon in USA gives info to Police, CIA, FBI without warrant!) or deficient democracy. It doesn't matter if it's called AI or not. The fact is that it's not economically viable and that will cut it back, not consumer protection (though eventually the EU will notice, the only organisation that cares about consumers).

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by shanghaichica

I think Amazon’s problem is that they have too many sales in their devices.

I doubt it. They probably only sell stuff below cost that will either make a profit selling other stuff or to shift obsolescent inventory that's costing in storage space.

[John F]

Originally Posted by Quoth

...

And the speaking and getting clever answers is a lie, depending on 1000s of cheap human workers.

...

Do you have a link to where the "1000s" number comes from, please?

[andyh2000]

Originally Posted by John F

Do you have a link to where the "1000s" number comes from, please?

Probably something like https://www.businessinsider.com/what...19-1?r=US&IR=T or https://time.com/5568815/amazon-work...sten-to-alexa/ which as I understand it are about people correcting bad answers, improving results etc. i.e. training the AI. They aren't in call centres answering questions. Lock a human in a sealed room for their whole life with no teachers and nobody to learn from and they wouldn't learn much either.

Andrew

[John F]

Originally Posted by andyh2000

Probably something like https://www.businessinsider.com/what...19-1?r=US&IR=T or https://time.com/5568815/amazon-work...sten-to-alexa/ which as I understand it are about people correcting bad answers, improving results etc. i.e. training the AI. They aren't in call centres answering questions. Lock a human in a sealed room for their whole life with no teachers and nobody to learn from and they wouldn't learn much either.

Andrew

Thank you.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by andyh2000

Probably something like https://www.businessinsider.com/what...19-1?r=US&IR=T or https://time.com/5568815/amazon-work...sten-to-alexa/ which as I understand it are about people correcting bad answers, improving results etc. i.e. training the AI. They aren't in call centres answering questions. Lock a human in a sealed room for their whole life with no teachers and nobody to learn from and they wouldn't learn much either.

Andrew

That first article seems a bit outdated:

"Alexa shows no sign of slowing down."
"We're so bullish on voice as the future. "

Maybe now, not so much....

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Either Alexa will become dumber only answering/doing already programmed stuff, or be shut down.

So long as Alexa is doing what it currently does, most users will likely be fine.

At least Google Assistant and Siri make sense. They have a home on millions of phones. Alexa was the off one, yet for a while there seemed to be the most popular.

My brother who uses this stuff way more than I do and has used all three said Alexa was the best. He tried moving to Google Assistant when he was mad at Amazon about something or other, but said it just didn't compare.

For me, I like using my Google speakers to set alarms and timers, tell me the weather, maybe play some news podcasts in the morning or play music throughout the day. For my needs that is all they need to do.