MICROSOFT ONLINE SUPPORT: IS COGNITIVE SERVICES REALLY BENEFITING US?
MICROSOFT ONLINE SUPPORT: IS COGNITIVE SERVICES REALLY BENEFITING
US?
By DAVID CORNELL FEBRUARY 7, 2017
When you hear the words “Microsoft online support,” you
probably think of an operator waiting to help you with common problems
revolving around Windows. There is another kind of online service, though,
called Cognitive Services, and Microsoft is pushing to make it part of
everyone’s life.
If this sounds familiar, you may have seen a certain
James Cameron film where robots take over and attempt to eradicate human life.
Terminator 2: Judgment Day, The Matrix, and Enemy of the State have all tackled
the rise of Artificial Intelligence and its darker implications. Stephen
Hawking has also come out publicly, stating that a scenario similar to the
Terminator movies is very likely if we try to make robots sentient.
Technically, Enemy of the State was a closer scenario to
what Microsoft is attempting to do, using interconnected devices to search for
criminals, as well as other less militant concepts. Hopefully, it doesn’t end
up with an innocent man who unknowingly acquired some stolen device being
ruined in the effort to retrieve it. Snip …..
The Microsoft online support program Cognitive Services,
according to the official Microsoft blog, has been making improvements to voice
recognition we probably haven’t noticed. Bing has evolved to the point of being
able to detect and translate dialects, accents, and even tones of voice in a
crowd into relatable text. With the variety of ways we speak these days,
languages spanning Asian, Latin, and Russian, varying accents within them, and
various speech impediments, it helps close the gaps between cultures. That
scene in The Big Bang Theory featuring Barry Kripke (John Ross Bowie)
demonstrating the limitations of average voice to text software by trying and
failing to use it is a perfect example of what Microsoft has aimed to
eliminate.
Mike Seltzer, a principal researcher in the Speech and
Dialog Research Group in Redmond, Washington, says that the software being used
in Bing, Skype Translator, and Cortana has been developed over more than a
decade. The software is expected to have useful applications even in gaming.
The implications could revolutionize games like Mass
Effect and other PC MMO titles, translating spoken words directly to text and
eliminating the dialogue menu box for a more organic form of human-to-software
communication. It might also be helpful for multiplayer titles like the next
Call of Duty, relaying spoken words to on-screen text for players not using an
earpiece.
Alexander Mejia is attempting to use Microsoft’s
technology to allow further immersion with virtual reality devices. His
company, Human Interact, seems to be aiming to outdo the Oculus Rift by
offering interactive storytelling experiences and bringing more action-heavy
games to the virtual reality genre. A possible scenario might include a World
War II-based FPS where you order your soldiers to do various things, possibly
ranging from stealthy guerrilla combat to all-out run-and-gun.
The more practical applications might disturb people who
feel that the NSA is already too invasive in our lives. One includes using
cameras of all kinds to extract information about people for the sake of
learning. There is already years’ worth of information recorded every day
through surveillance cameras, as well as smartphones and the like. Prism is one
such application, using video footage to help shoppers find what they’re
looking for.
The recent Vizio lawsuit, for example, centered around
the TV manufacturer using internet-connected TVs to collect viewing information
on their consumers, as reported by the Wall Street Journal. They stated that
they didn’t collect things like personal information as much as simply what
people were watching, a tactic similar to what Facebook and Google do every day
to target marketing tactics. This is why, when you visit sites like
Weather.com, your browsing device automatically knows where you are. Your ISP
tells websites where you live.
Microsoft’s online support through Cognitive Services
could easily go very wrong, but the positive aspects may prove to make law
enforcement more efficient, shopping easier, and video games even more
immersive. It might even find its way into self-driving cars, helping you
control the vehicle without using your hands or feet.
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