Week 9: Clear on Increase in Machine Intelligence

How Computers May Outsmart us 

by the End of the Century

"Machine vision" by Stuart Caie

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kyz/2912259398/lightbox/

Creative Commons License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

        After listening to the speech made by  Michio Kaku, I was extremely interested in what could potentially happen to us if machines were to continue advancing as they are today.  The picture above is just a brief example of what machines are doing today. The machine shown above is playing connect four against itself, and as you can see, it understands the concept quite well.

        Michio Kaku first stated that our machines today are only as smart as insects. This is not potentially dangerous at all. He then went on to say that soon enough they could be as smart as mice. After that, they would be as smart as cats as dogs.

        Then I was shocked. Michio Kaku then stated how by the end of the century, our machines may be as smart as monkeys.  If machines are as smart as monkeys, they can potentially conjure up their own plans, make their own strategies, and own decisions. They DO NOT need to listen to you if they choose not to. Monkeys have enough of a brain capacity to do things on their own.

        This may be potentially dangerous to us because if machines become murderous, we could be in deep trouble. If we continue to manufacture smarter and smarter machines, they may outsmart us eventually. There have been large groups of people that have even gotten together to specify when they believe machines will eventually become smarter than us!

This is important in business because a company may rely on machines for all of its work, and when machines become smarter, what if they choose not to work? What if they choose to rebel? Our technology industry could be shattered if someone similar to this happens. We are much better off with keeping our machines' intelligence far from our level.

A great resource I enjoyed reading while looking up this topic was found here:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17518-smart-machines-whats-the-worst-that-could-happen.html

The author describes how machines are getting smarter, and could become potentially dangerous. Check it out!

Week 7: Clear on Open Source

Open Source Software

"nom nom nom" by Matt McGee

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pleeker/3006047398/

Creative Commons License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

What is Open Source Software?

Open source software is always freely distributed software that contains the source code of the program. When developers include the source code with their software, they are giving you the opportunity to find errors in the software, or develop your own version of the software and make changes to the existing software.

What can you do with Open Source software?

You can do the following things with open source software:

• You can develop your own version of the software
• You can create new features to the software
• You can fix errors in the software (and make money doing it)
• You can distribute your own version of the software

So what are the downsides to using Open Source Software?

As seen in the picture above, with having a dog comes other responsibilities. The dog must be fed, walked, and tended to daily. Much like a dog, open source software that you develop may have problems, or you may need to hire other individuals to change the existing code for your company. Once these changes are made, you can sell the software.  Why is this important in business, you ask? Your company may be just starting up and may need to decide whether they would like to pay for their software, or use open source software as an alternative. This may be very cost-effective, and can bring the company off the ground if they develop their own strains of the open source software.

What are some examples of Open Source Software available today?

Some of the most popular examples of open source software include (but are not limited to):

• Mozilla Firefox
• Filezilla
• RealVNC
• WGet
• Audacity
• Gimp
• OpenOffice
• Linux
• Apache

And many, many more!

A great source that I've found while researching Open Source software can be found here:

http://www.howstuffworks.com/question435.htm

This website will help answer anything you are unsure about with Open Source software!

Thanks for reading! See you next week!

Week 4: Clear on Competiton and Competitive Advantage in Business

Competitive Advantage & Competition in Business

"PC vs Mac" by Sergio de Candelario Delgado

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hades87/2688943823/

Creative Commons License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

This week I was particularly clear on the concept of competitive advantage in business. 

First off, competitive advantage is both good and bad to the industry and it's consumers. When the iPhone first came out, everyone had to have one. Now, phones with an Android operating system have similar capabilities that the iPhone has, almost as if they copied the phone exactly and tweaked a few things.

Competition in Business is GOOD for the industry because:

• It leaves room for improvements in the products in the industry
• Will lead to stronger products with more features
• Will drive innovation so that companies will want to be the head of the industry with the leading product

Competition in Business is BAD for the industry because:

• Companies have to worry about doing any task better than their rivals
• Companies can't do the same thing as each other. They have to be unique
• Companies can copycat products and tweak them to be their own.
• Will lead to bad blood between companies (Mac vs P.C.)

Any product you create needs to be: Valuable, Rare, Imperfectly imitable, & Nonsubstitutable if you wish to come out on top of the industry without any companies stealing your ideas or your product structure. 

In the end, competitive advantage and competition is vital in business because companies live off of copycatting products and making them better. Many "iPhone clones" have helped keep businesses alive because people believe that the product is the iPhone, except better. Without competition, each company would only have very few products, and wouldn't make the revenue they do today.

A link that I found particularly interesting when researching competition and competitive advantage was the following:

http://www.yeartosuccess.com/members/y2s/blog/VIEW/00000008/00000062/Competition-is-Good.html

The link above describes three rules that will help your company benefit from your competition and come out on top.


I hope you enjoyed my blog post for the week! I'll catch you next week! :)