I'm not clicking on any Watson propaganda videos. I clicked this one because it's a parody. I watch Jeopardy regulary and saw it Monday and Tuesday. This thing was annoying and distracting in the game. I ignore the program any time they're not actually doing questions, especially the painfully awkward contestant interactions after the first commercial break. So I missed the part about it not using voice recognition. Fine, it's text recognition. Even less impressive.

When I say the engine is Google-Like I mean it's like instant search where it whittles down and adds context in real-time as you feed data. Not that it's just a big search engine.

To me having Watson on Jeopardy is just annoying, like celebrity or kids week.

>> ^budzos:

Every fucking video is about Watson. It's voice recognition attached to a Google-like Database. I'm interested in technology etc even specifically about the relative plateau in voice recognition accuracy rates from 1997 to just recently.. but seriously [quit it] with the Watson videos.

Maybe you should read up a bit more on Watson before you continue raging against "every fucking video" about it, or at least have watched one of the shows this week that actually explained how Watson works.


It's not even about voice-recognition; Watson received the clues in a text-based format, so understanding what Trebek says, or even the other players, has nothing to do with it (in fact Watson repeated the same wrong answer given by one of the human players at least once). And its database is just a small part of it; it's more about understanding and parsing language and using that to find the correct answer, not just having all of Wikipedia to search through.

>> ^chilaxe:

Watson wasn't amused: "When we take over, Trebek, you'll be the first to go."


Sounds like Sean Connery on SNL.

Watson had some funny answers, including the Final Jeopardy question, but he blew both humans away - he won with $35,734 to Rutter's $10,000 and Jenning's $4800 (and that is after the humans effectively doubled their scores).

>> ^dag:

Absolutely fascinating. I'm going to give this another promote as the Jeopardy Episodes start tonight! (February 14th)


Let's get Siftbot on it too for the next game event. Maybe he can beat IBM Watson!

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Absolutely fascinating. I'm going to give this another *promote as the Jeopardy Episodes start tonight! (February 14th)

While they mentioned Chess, there was no mention of the Computer Go problem, that is, getting a computer to be able to play Go beyond the level of studied amateur. Still a great episode of Nova as usual. I would love to see IBM tackle that next since that would solve a few more key issues like visual/spacial issues, then combine wherever they are with the Deep Blue and their goals of the Watson program with whatever they would call their Go computer and you would have a fairly nice AI system.
I wonder why they didn't plug in speech recognition so it could hear the answers... of course at the same time a real Jeopardy player may buzz in before he finishes so I guess it needs to be able to see the answer at the same time...

>> ^Chaucer:

This was only the first round score. It went on:
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/01/13/ibm-watson-takes-jeopardy
-champs/
"Though Watson ended the exhibition in the lead with $4,400 compared to Jenning’s $3,400 and Rutter’s $1,200, a continuation of that battle shown on internal televisions during lunch revealed that Jenning had pulled ahead after scoring a Daily Double. Watson still isn’t perfect, it seems."
>> ^entr0py:
>> ^Chaucer:
Actually, this story has been going around that the computer won. Which is WRONG! If you get the rest of the story, you'll know that the computer ends up getting stomped by Jennings by the end of the segment.

You're probably thinking of a different test. Watson did win the game shown in the video. Though they only played single Jeopardy. http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/13/ibms-wat
son-supercomputer-destroys-all-humans-in-jeopardy-pract/
Final Score
Watson : $4,400
Ken : $3,400
Brad : $1,200.



I hope they do more of these with v2, v3, v4, Skynet, etc.

This was only the first round score. It went on:
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/01/13/ibm-watson-takes-jeopardy-champs/

"Though Watson ended the exhibition in the lead with $4,400 compared to Jenning’s $3,400 and Rutter’s $1,200, a continuation of that battle shown on internal televisions during lunch revealed that Jenning had pulled ahead after scoring a Daily Double. Watson still isn’t perfect, it seems."

>> ^entr0py:

>> ^Chaucer:
Actually, this story has been going around that the computer won. Which is WRONG! If you get the rest of the story, you'll know that the computer ends up getting stomped by Jennings by the end of the segment.

You're probably thinking of a different test. Watson did win the game shown in the video. Though they only played single Jeopardy. http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/13/ibms-wat
son-supercomputer-destroys-all-humans-in-jeopardy-pract/
Final Score
Watson : $4,400
Ken : $3,400
Brad : $1,200.

>> ^Chaucer:

Actually, this story has been going around that the computer won. Which is WRONG! If you get the rest of the story, you'll know that the computer ends up getting stomped by Jennings by the end of the segment.


You're probably thinking of a different test. Watson did win the game shown in the video. Though they only played single Jeopardy. http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/13/ibms-watson-supercomputer-destroys-all-humans-in-jeopardy-pract/

Final Score
Watson : $4,400
Ken : $3,400
Brad : $1,200.

>> ^Chaucer:

Actually, this story has been going around that the computer won. Which is WRONG! If you get the rest of the story, you'll know that the computer ends up getting stomped by Jennings by the end of the segment.


URL for the story?

>> ^Payback:

>> ^ant:
>> ^quantumushroom:
I for one welcome our new...ah fuck it.

There's a group called "ah fuck it"?

You have another explanation for the popularity of Sarah Palin?


Yeah, because she's hot? j/k!

>> ^ant:

>> ^quantumushroom:
I for one welcome our new...ah fuck it.

There's a group called "ah fuck it"?


You have another explanation for the popularity of Sarah Palin?

>> ^entr0py:

>> ^bmacs27:

>> ^ant:

>> ^Zyrxil:

You can only buzz in after the answer is read.


Didn't they used to in the past? What happens if you did it early?


I think there might be a delay before you can buzz again. So it is disadvantageous to buzz early.


That's true, but the delay is only 1/4th of a second. So those contestants you see just furiously spamming the buzzer aren't stupid, it's still a valid strategy. At least you're almost guaranteed to get a buzz in within the first quarter second.

I think this is why the squishy humans have any chance to answer. It's got to be difficult for an AI to precisely judge when a question is over. I wouldn't be surprised if Watson uses the buzzer spam method.


I like to spam.

>> ^bmacs27:

>> ^ant:
>> ^Zyrxil:
You can only buzz in after the answer is read.

Didn't they used to in the past? What happens if you did it early?

I think there might be a delay before you can buzz again. So it is disadvantageous to buzz early.


That's true, but the delay is only 1/4th of a second. So those contestants you see just furiously spamming the buzzer aren't stupid, it's still a valid strategy. At least you're almost guaranteed to get a buzz in within the first quarter second.

I think this is why the squishy humans have any chance to answer. It's got to be difficult for an AI to precisely judge when a question is over. I wouldn't be surprised if Watson uses the buzzer spam method.

Oh, it seems Watson now has an actual buzzer that he has to hit with his robo digit. I'd say giving that thing a finger is a fatal step in the wrong direction.