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12 <h2><a href='
0102639856.html'
>'I've Seen the Future of Consumer AI, and it Doesn't Have One' (theregister.co.uk)
</a></h2>
13 <div class='details'
>(Thursday September
06,
2018 @
11:
30PM (msmash)
14 from the there-is-no-spoon dept.)
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17 Andrew Orlowski of The Register recounts all the gadgets supercharged with AI that he came across at IFA tradeshow last week -- and wonders what value AI brought to the table. He writes: I didn
't see a blockchain toothbrush at IFA in Berlin last week, but I
'm sure there was one lurking about somewhere. With
30 vast halls to cover, I didn
't look too hard for it. But I did see many things almost as tragic that no one could miss -- AI being squeezed into almost every conceivable bit of consumer electronics. But none were convincing. If ever there was a solution looking for a problem, it
's ramming AI into gadgets to show of a company
's machine learning prowess. For the consumer it adds unreliability, cost and complexity, and the annoyance of being prompted. [...] Back to LG, which takes
2018's prize for sticking AI into a superfluous gadget. The centrepiece of its AI efforts this year is a robot, ClOi. Put Google Assistant or Alexa on wheels, and you have ClOi. I asked the booth person what exactly ClOi could do to be told
"it can take notes for your shopping list.
" Why wasn
't this miracle of the Fourth Industrial Revolution let loose on the LG floor? I wondered -- a question answered by this account of ClOi
's debut at CES in January. Clearly things haven
't improved much -- this robot buddy was kept indoors.