AI Business Podcast

Petrina Kamya, head of AI platforms at Insilico Medicine, talks to Andrew Brosnan, principal analyst in AI and Applied Intelligence at Omdia, to take a deep dive into the intricacies of AI-powered drug discovery.

In this episode, Peter Stone, executive director of Sony AI, joins AI Business Assistant Editor Ben Wodecki to discuss this year's RoboCup and the AI that can beat you at Gran Turismo. 

This week, the editorial team shares the most profound things we have learned about AI over the past 37 episodes. The reason is simple: Tien is departing for pastures new, Max is making a lateral move to Data Center Knowledge, and Sebastian…  Is doing Sebastian things. Which means this will be the last time the podcast will feature the current cast. Ben is not going anywhere, by the way; the podcast is in his hands, and you can look forward to many more episodes following a short break! In this episode, we try to share the most important things we have learned: Max will scream that AI is just software, and software is still eating the world; Sebastian will bemoan the fact that despite all the potential for innovation, the entire AI market ended up being dominated by the same three or four familiar names that already control most of the world’s IT infrastructure. Ben will highlight the importance of training, and the fact that for all the assumed intelligence, AI systems can only do the things they are painstakingly taught to do – but he’s hopeful about some of the applications. And Tien will wonder about the sheer variety of things people call AI – how do you make sense of something that applies in both pharmacological research and sewer management? We also cover: Body odour! Kwisatz haderach! Reporting on weird stuff! Potential future collaboration! For the last time, you can find the people responsible for the podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

We delve into the irrational world of WorldCoin – the unlikely enterprise backed by child prodigy Sam Altman that wants your eyeballs. To scan them. Using a shiny metal orb. In exchange for some virtual currency. This is not an elaborate joke – investors have reportedly valued WorldCoin at $1 billion, and the eyeball harvesting operation is in full swing. There are 30 prototype orbs in the field, according to TechCrunch, scanning up to 700 eyeballs per week. They want thousands of orbs, and eventually – a billion eyeballs, each representing a singular and unique cryptocurrency user. But before we get to the orb, we discuss the US military, and its plans for a robotic tank unit. For now, the US Army Futures Command’s Next Generation Combat Cross-Functional Team is putting together a bunch old M113 armored personnel carriers, and is making them shoot each other. The likes of BAE Systems, General Dynamics, and Oshkosh Defense have all been tasked with designing prototype unmanned combat vehicles for the US Army – the only question is how quickly these will appear on the battlefield. As always, you can find the people responsible for the podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week, the editorial team at AI Business looks at the most important stories of the summer – and attempts to predict which will make the biggest impact on the AI landscape. We start with the idea of a metaverse/omniverse that is gaining serious traction, with Nvidia now offering businesses tools to create detailed 3D copies of their real-world assets that operate based on real-world data. Virtualize all the things! Next on the agenda are Facebook’s smart glasses – produced in collaboration with Ray-Ban, and ostensibly designed to film everything in sight, much like Snap’s Spectacles. Are we finally OK with the idea of being surveilled all the time, or are these liable to get the wearer punched in the face? The third trend of note is automated code generation with AI. The latest and most notable effort in this space involves Microsoft, GitHub, and OpenAI – exactly the names you would expect to make code auto-completion practical and easy to use. What will this mean for today’s software developers? And finally, we take a look at what’s happening with our favourite tech billionaires. They are all going to space – but unfortunately keep coming back. AI has a role to play here, too – helping us manage thousands of objects in orbit and clean up space rubbish. We also cover: Digital Twins! Second Life! Moon colonies! Svalbard! Thank you for attending this group therapy session. As always, you can find the people responsible for the circus podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week, we discuss ethics, government regulation, and similarities between AI and cars in the 1910s with Natalia Modjeska, research director for AI and intelligent automation at analyst firm Omdia. Natalia joined Omdia just a few months ago, having spent years implementing and benchmarking AI and analytics projects across organizations like PwC and Info-Tech Research Group – you can find some of her observations on Towards Data Science. We start with ethics in AI – which is shaping up as one of the hottest topics of 2021, often discussed in mainstream media. But why the sudden interest? And does the responsibility for preventing any potential harms created by AI-based systems sit with the executives and boards of directors, or with governments and regulatory agencies? According to Natalia, the situation around AI resembles the appearance of first mass-produced cars; these machines were clearly useful, but they were also very dangerous since they had to drive across roads designed for pedestrians and horse-drawn carriages, with no street signs, traffic lights, or highway codes. This lack of safeguards can be addressed – let’s just hope it doesn’t take 70 years to create an equivalent of a frontal airbag for AI. We also cover: The Draft EU Regulation on AI! The first traffic light! Cloning! Lawyers! China! [tired sigh] Like and subscribe. As always, you can find the people responsible for the podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Natalia Modjeska (@NataliaModjeska)

We talk about the rapid uptake of self-driving vehicles in China, the climate impact of video streaming, and the English town of Milton Keynes, which has emerged as one of the primary hubs for autonomous vehicle tech in the UK. All of this, and more, is discussed in What’s the News With Wodecki, a segment in which Ben takes us through the stories of the week, with the podcast team deciding whether – in hindsight – they were worthy of coverage. This is an editorial bootcamp, and there’s a timer on comments to stop Sebastian. The stories on offer include: Alibaba’s AutoX subsidiary sharing, in excruciating detail, what a trip in one of its robo-taxis is like. The company has been running the service for 100 days in Shenzhen, a city that has relaxed its regulations to become a playground for domestic autonomous vehicle developers; Baidu launching the first robo-taxi service in Beijing – but in a much more limited capacity; China’s Pony.ai partnering up with LiDAR superstar Luminar [right?] for its own autonomous vehicles; iSize raising $6.3 million in Series A to develop AI-based video compression algorithms that could shrink the environmental impact (and costs) of streaming, without compromising picture quality as perceived by the human eye; The tiny little robots from Starship Technologies arriving in Milton Keynes to deliver coffee. We also cover: Star Trek TNG! Urban planning! Mango and passion fruit coolers! Check out Part One of the podcast that aired earlier this week, where we share some thoughts on the ransomware attack against the Colonial Pipeline. Give us a loike, Hairy Biscuits and Cheese, guv'nor*. As always, you can find the people responsible for the circus podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week, we mourn the death of the Digidog and descend into the greasy, fragrant world of robot-powered kitchens. Miso Robotics, the company responsible for Flippy, the burger-flipping robot, has launched a commercial service for restaurants that uses computer vision and AI to automatically identify and track ingredients, dishes and tasks. But would you pay more for robot-made food, or would you pay less? We start with the untimely demise of the Digidog, a version of the Boston Dynamics’ four-legged Spot robot that was employed by the New York Police Department. The vehicle was “put down,” in the words of mayor De Blasio, after it turned out the NYPD couldn’t actually use it because it failed to declare it as a surveillance device. The public opinion on the matter could have also played a part – it turned out the residents of New York weren’t all that exited about the noisy, confusing machine participating in run-of-the-mill arrests. Another robot, Flippy – previously discussed in Episode 6 – is now part of an expanded service from Miso, called CookRight – enabling restaurants to “apply precision cooking to a variety of grilled food items on their menus.” The software comes with a self-installation kit that includes a user interface tablet, cameras, and a small computer. Miso president, Buck Jordan, says automation will keep the industry alive and stimulate growth – but we are not entirely convinced. We also cover: John Cheese! Working at Maccy D’s! The return of Retiarii! Truckers (again)! Did you smash that like button? As always, you can find the people responsible for the podcast online: Max ‘Eighteen Wheels’ Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian ‘Hunter of East Sussex’ Moss (@SebMoss) Tien ‘Secret Millionaire’ Fu (@tienchifu) Ben ‘Ginger Spice’ Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week on the AI Business podcast, we look at the draft European Regulation on artificial intelligence, a.k.a. the Artificial Intelligence Act. This long-expected piece of legislation will be the first attempt to regulate AI on a super-national level – but does it go far enough to meet the aim of stopping AI systems that pose a ‘clear threat’ to citizens’ rights and livelihoods? Is not just a draft, but a declaration of intent – the proposed policy offers a vision that’s very different from both the relaxed regulatory approach seen in the US, and the embrace of AI for the purposes of the state that is practiced in China. The EU framework Proposes to categorize AI systems in terms of their impact, and the risk they pose. ‘Unacceptable risk' would cover systems that are deemed to be a "clear threat to the safety, livelihoods, and rights of people” – like systems designed to manipulate human behavior, or those used for ‘social scoring.’ The ‘High-risk’ category would cover systems for critical infrastructure, and some systems for law enforcement. ‘Limited risk’ and ‘Minimal risk’ categories would cover products like chatbots, AI-enabled video games, and spam filters. The draft seems to take a strong position on biometric surveillance systems in public spaces. At first sight, these appear to be banned, but the document lists a large number of potential exceptions. We’re not the only ones confused by this; the EU's chief data protection supervisor is confused too. We also cover: Gonzo the Cat! Bernie memorabilia! Reasons to distrust the intelligence services! Apple VS Facebook! As always, you can find the people responsible for the circus podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week, we welcome our new reporter Ben Wodecki – and make him defend his favorite news stories of the week in a public forum. Because we’re nice like that. We also discuss Microsoft, after the company’s early bet on augmented reality finally paid off in a military hardware contract with the US Army worth up to $22 billion. A lot to unpack here. We start with the epic story of super-helmets for American super-soldiers. The US Army is going to have 120,000 of these, courtesy of Microsoft and its HoloLens project – long considered by many industry observers, including yours truly, to be nothing but an expensive gimmick. We were wrong. Defense is the quintessential early adopter – and any technology developed for the army will later filter down to the rest of the market. This was true for digital photography (originally for spy satellites), GPS (originally for nukes) and microwave ovens (originally for air defense), and it will be true for AR. If you listen carefully, you can hear thousands of venture capitalists invested in AR startups cry out in ecstasy. Next, it’s time for What’s The News With Wodecki (WTNWW), a segment in which we make our new reporter Ben run a journalistic gauntlet: he talks us through his favorite stories of the week, and we (me) pronounce our editorial judgment on whether a story will develop further and is worth following. And there’s a five-minute timer on any debate, so we don’t get sidetracked. We also mention: Butterflies on Amazon! Yu-Gi-Oh! Exoskeletons! Ben’s cooking! Traffic in Vietnam! As always, you can find the people responsible for the circus podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu) Ben Wodecki (@benwodecki)

This week, we talk massive shifts at at Intel, poke gentle fun at Peloton, and explore the not-so-wonderful world of robot poetry. Peloton has purchased three AI-powered startups, namely voice assistant developer Aiqudo, smartwatch company Atlas Wearables, and interactive workout mat startup Otari. But will it be enough to keep the company competitive? Can Peloton hang on to the market niche it created? Dramatic stuff.

We return after a short break, to talk about empathy, advertising, and Palantir, an AI company that built a business worth $15 billion with 30 salespeople – now featuring in its very own drinking game! We begin by talking about Moods, a service from Vevo, the company that owns and manages most music videos on the Internet. Moods now uses AI to identify the tone and emotion of music in order to help advertisers more effectively target their campaigns – initial options include ‘fun,’ ‘heartfelt,’ ‘impassioned,’ and ‘empowering.’ Now, the obvious problem with this service is it ignores the less positive emotions that are integral to art, like sadness, despair, and perhaps even hatred. How can we teach computers to understand human emotion? And if the advertisers, in their infinite wisdom, choose to focus exclusively on positive emotions, who’s going to bankroll the next Nine Inch Nails? In the second part of the podcast, we continue talking about one of our favorite subjects – AI, analytics, and surveillance wunder-venture Palantir. But there’s a plot twist: every time we mention the name of its founder, libertarian saint Peter Thiel, Max drinks. You can hear the podcast descending into chaos and almost feel the anguish of our publisher. What happened with Palantir? Well, the company is actually going from the strength to strength, and has secured a major distribution deal leveraging IBM’s considerable sales muscle. This means a lot more Palantir software, used by many more government agencies and corporations – joining the ranks of the CIA, the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, LAPD and the Space Force. We also cover: Gym music! Shoes! Doomscrolling! Things wrong with IBM! As always, you can find the people responsible for the circus podcast online: Max Smolaks (@maxsmolax) Sebastian Moss (@SebMoss) Tien Fu (@tienchifu)