The Year in Computing—How 2012 Brought Better Artificial Intelligence and Much More

This article was first published on 2 January 2013.

This article is a nice summary of developments in artificial intelligence over the past twelve months.

For me, the developments relating to personal digital assistants are the most interesting.  Progress in the past couple of years in technologies that make these assistants possible has been staggering. While their still only in the formative stages they’re definitely the subject of major efforts by some of the largest players in the industry and I expect we’ll see rapid improvements in capability, competence, user friendliness etc. in the next five to ten years.

I don’t see these assistants as merely being gimmicks.  I think they will evolve into very real advisors across a broad range of service industries.  Professional services practitioners look out!