The disembodied voice of IBM’s Watson super computer intoned its correct Final Jeopardy! answer to the complex question provided by game show host Alex Trebek and I knew something had changed forever.
It was not so much that Watson beat the tar out of its two flesh-and-blood competitors, but that over the three-day Jeopardy! competition Watson had become a personality. Viewer’s marveled over the computer’s quirky bet choices. Even though they had to know they were based on some sort of complex algorithm that factored in every possible fiscal permutation and scenario in which Watson’s competitors could still win, if Watson flubbed the last question. Watson’s clipped, computer-generated voice was never particularly endearing, but I’m sure people were picking out the any nuance that might hint at some sort emotional intention or response.
Over a 72-hour period Watson transformed from a rack of powerful servers to a character that would soon perform other feats of intellectual strength. Naturally, this has led to countless stories about the deeper meaning of this triumph of technology over man. As a member of this industry, I felt something too—a subtle shift of the tectonic plates below our everyday lives.
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Yet, as I watched this momentous occasion unfold and vanquished former Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings offered one last written witticism on his Final Jeopardy! answer (“I, for one, welcome our computer overlords”) my son’s brand new computer sat beside me updating its Windows 7 64-bit installation with 25—count ’em 25—separate updates. It continued this activity for well over an hour, long after Jeopardy! finished airing—and I realized that in the world of everyday computing we still have a very, very long way to go.
As I complained on Twitter about the need to update a brand-new computer in this fashion, some of my Twitter followers leapt to my computer’s defense and counseled patience and understanding. Getting these updates is a good thing, they told me. They pinned the blame on OEMs that have to seal the system and OS image at some point in order to deliver the new PC to market. Problem is, this is a new model and I ordered this PC direct from ASUS. It didn’t sit on some retailer’s shelf for months or even weeks. ASUS got the order and delivered it within days.
I agree that Windows should be fully up-to-date when you use it, but there has to be a better way.
Granted, IBM’s Watson is a super computer, so no average desktop or laptop can be expected to match its computational feats, to talk to you in the same way, or understand its own needs as clearly as a computer that can figure out the odd “answers and questions” format Jeopardy! favors. I don’t think consumers expect that either. In fact, people like me would be happy if new computers simply worked without intervention from day one. We do not accept this situation on any of our other products. Imagine, for example, your frustration if the car you bought yesterday required that you change, or even simply rotate its tires before you could drive it around?
There is simply such an enormous distance between the wonder of IBM’s Watson and our home computing experiences. Now that Watson has put Jennings and the other former Jeopardy! champ Brad Rutter in their place, people will forget that our everyday computing reality is still one where we need to give our computers a fair amount of assistance to do what they need to do.
Here’s another example with the very same computer and I think it illustrates how far we’ve come and how far we still have to go with desktop computing. For some unknown reason my Norton Internet Security (NIS) 2011 installation on the new ASUS laptop was not functioning properly. The Sonar part of the NIS system protection would not turn on. Symantec’s in-product, automated support helped me identify the problem and did, with some gentle prodding from me, guide me to a solution. I had to uninstall and reinstall the security software. Doing so is not simple because security software is designed to fight malware that might disable or even uninstall it. So, yes, there’s a special app to help you remove Symantec’s own products. As you might expect, it comes from Symantec. I followed Symantec’s instructions and tried to install the removal tool, but Symantec’s software-guided support was unable to answer this simple Jeopardy! style question: “64-Bit.” The correct answer? “Which version of Windows 7 is Lance’s computer running?” As a result, the support process led me to a 32-bit removal tool, which my system could not run. I eventually found the 64-bit one. Once I ran that, restarted the system, and selected the right software to reinstall, Symantec did not make me re-input my serial number. That was smart.
So a little bit of intelligence in there, but not nearly enough. Where’s the self-awareness? Where are the super-smarts? IBM’s Watson would have figured all this out in a nanosecond, but then it would not have had these problems in the first place.
Microsoft, Symantec, ASUS and everyone else making technology for consumers, I have a warning for you: IBM and Watson have just put you on notice. Your customers have seen the future on Jeopardy!, and they’re gonna want it now.