Alibaba is investing huge sums in AI research and resources

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/610219/inside-the-chinese-lab-that-plans-to-rewire-the-world-with-ai/

by nl • 8 years ago

96 38 8 years ago

thisisit• 8 years ago

More impressive still, all this happens successfully in the middle of a crowded, noisy station. Each kiosk has to figure out who is speaking to it; zero in on that person’s voice within the crowd; transcribe the incoming speech; parse its meaning; and compare the person’s face against a massive database of photos—all within a few seconds.

At the risk of sounding cynical, what is more impressive is that even if the kiosk either mis-identifies a voice or zeroes-in on the wrong person or mis-transcribes the incoming speech or parses incorrectly or cannot compare a person face or unable to connect to the database or identification takes more than a minute - no one will ever ever hear about it. The person complaining might get some points from his social score or go to jail.

But, we will get an article from MIT making it sound like everything works flawlessly.

mark_l_watson• 8 years ago

It is probably a prototype system. That said, this is the way you make progress: you build something, and see if it performs well enough, meeting people’s needs.

Andrew Ng had a great demo of detecting one voice in a party environment in one of his old classes. It was a matlab/octave one-liner.

Here in the US, we have had some fine successes by organizations like DARPA ‘going long’ and taking funding risks. Now the Chinese are doing the same.

tibbetts• 8 years ago

DARPA and friends should go long. But it would be nice if journalists didn’t act like problems were completely solved the first time they see a prototype. That kind of hype is how you get AI winter.

taneq• 8 years ago

Man with clock knows what time it is. Man with two clocks never quite sure.

If you don't test something then it's 100% reliable.

cscurmudgeon2• 8 years ago

In Soviet China, AI measures your performance.

wenc• 8 years ago

But, we will get an article from MIT making it sound like everything works flawlessly.

Well, I don't want to speak to the draconian political implications of this -- that is a separate issue with troubling implications -- but I do want to address the general notion that imperfection should prevent a system (any system) from being practical.

Just because it's not perfect doesn't mean it is not usable -- you just need to create rules that govern what actions can be taken. We do this with almost any real world system (vehicle routing, plant control, etc.). No predictive model is perfect, and we practitioners understand this and regulate our behavior accordingly, often through simple rules. We build in checks, overrides and recourses. Us techies often think of technological solutions as being all-encompassing, forget how much of a human element (and human judgment) there is in real-world feedback loops.

Also, lest people think parsing out multiple sources from a signal is a new thing, Blind Source Separation [0] is the name that has been given to the study of this type of problem (sometimes called the "cocktail party problem"), and it has been studied for decades. Like most model inversion problems, it's known to be an underdetermined problem, and it is also known that you cannot get perfect separation all the time, but you can get a certain degree of separation if there is some signal (however weak) that helps discrimination. So it's not like practitioners have no idea about the potential issues -- most are acutely aware of them. This doesn't diminish the fact that the algorithms do actually work, for some definition of "work".

Techniques like ICA and NMF preceded DL approaches. It sounds like DL (deep learning) approaches hold promise on these types of problems, and this is something of note.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_signal_separation

seanmcdirmid4• 8 years ago

Does the shanghai subway now require IDs to use? That doesn’t sound right, they do spot checks for sure but...foreigners use it also.

And you don’t need to buy a ticket if your RF transit card is filled up, so the point of the kiosk checking ID via facial recognition is even weirder. Maybe they setup that condition for expository reasons? There is no way kiosks are going to screen everyone during rush hour, even if they work perfectly.

yorwba• 8 years ago

I'm pretty sure this is only a prototype in a single location. When I took the subway yesterday, I didn't see any face recognition anywhere. Then again I haven't recharged my transportation card in half a year, so maybe they now require ID for that. If they do, foreigners are probably identified by their passport.

seanmcdirmid4• 8 years ago

They might be, but face recognition isn’t going to work for that. Is this another case of foreigners waiting in line while Chinese get to use the kiosks (as when taking the train)?

I find the subway so annoying in china. It worked well until they started those damn security checkpoints, after that I just couldn’t justify taking it rather than a taxi.

zhte4152• 8 years ago

No, the Shanghai subway does not need IDs to use, nor do any subways in China. Buying a ticket needs no need for ID, nor does buying a pre-paid RFID-based card require an ID. The bag-check xray is bottle-neck enough.

Taking the train does require an ID card (or passport), as does taking a domestic flight.

seanmcdirmid4• 8 years ago

Yes, that’s how it was for me in 2016. They do spot check IDs in Beijing at least, but tend to leave foreigners alone. I never got what they would do if a chinese wasn’t carrying their ID, I imagine it isn’t very common to take that on the subway!

yters4• 8 years ago

It's funny in a disturbing way. NSA and Google use technology in an oppressive way and everyone is up in arms. China develops oppressive technology and journalists cannot stop singing their praise.

bilbo0s• 8 years ago

I think it's pretty clear people have been up in arms about population monitoring in both the US and China. In fact, if anything, we've been MORE critical of China.

Here is the fundamental problem in a nutshell:

The governments of China and the US simply don't care what we think.

That's the problem we need to solve.

yters4• 8 years ago

In America, we can do something about it through many avenues. In China, you get 'disappeared' for trying to do something about it. A bit of a difference.

rfdub• 8 years ago

Chinese AI "rewiring" the world is a terrifying notion, as I'm sure by mandatory design, China's version of Asimov's laws would basically put obeisance to the party and big daddy XI as their primary tenets.

coldtea• 8 years ago

As opposed to Trump and the US' "national interests", that have already caused untold pain in the world?

adamsea• 8 years ago

There are no heroes here.

SubiculumCode• 8 years ago

If China won't respect human rights, I would support moving away from them as a trade partner. There are other producers with more liberty for their people.

dqpb• 8 years ago

Does China actually view other countries as partners?

blackrock• 8 years ago

People do not view China as a trade partner.

Instead, China is viewed as an opportunity (to be exploited).

Apple, Dell, IBM, everyone, used them as cheap labor to get manufacturing costs down. So that they can sell that sweet iPhone for $1000, and make $800 in profits. Apple stock goes up. Your 401k is more valuable.

Then, there are more iPhone users in China, than there are in the United States. Apple can make more money selling services (music, apps, subscriptions) to them, than they do in the United States. Do you want to take away this sweet money tree from Apple?

Walmart views China as a cheap manufacturer. You can buy more plastic trinkets for less. So you spend more money, to buy more things. Win for you. Win for Walmart. Walmart stock goes up. Your 401k is more valuable.

If you want to kill the lucrative trade partnership with China, then you had better give a good explanation to all the people with their cushy 401k, why their retirement accounts are tanking.

The trade with China, may suck for the blue collar class, but it is very lucrative for the investor class. And for you, your 401k gets a nice bounce, so that you too, can get a share of the profits.

listic2• 8 years ago

Is any modern computer reading comprehension service available online?

listic2• 8 years ago

BiDAF - Bi-directional Attention Flow Demo by Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://allgood.cs.washington.edu:1995

kolbe2• 8 years ago

It's funny how many times that article mentions something that a Chinese company is doing that is basically a copy of what a US company has already done. And the only reasons the Chinese company is able to even be close is that China essentially bans US tech companies from participating in their economy, and probably because the government conducts espionage on their behalf.

This is a huge deal, and even though steel tariffs aren't a great solution, I at least appreciate that our government is treating China's behavior as a real threat.

SilverCurve• 8 years ago

I'm afraid the steel tariffs sabotage US trade and relation with allies more than China. Most steel imports don't come from China http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2018/mar/...

kolbe2• 8 years ago

Let me quote myself from the post you replied to:

"steel tariffs aren't a great solution"

resource0x• 8 years ago

Is the history repeating, or it just rhymes? :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_generation_computer

Alibaba is investing huge sums in AI research and resources

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