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Intelligent Software Agents - Are We Ready?
Anti-Luddite writes In an article on the Internet Evolution site, analyst Tom Nolle discusses the potential of 'Intelligent Software Agent (ISA)' technology. He points to specific types such as 'search assistant ISAs,' which will inevitably flop before their potential is realized. He speaks favorably of the 'mobile ISA' which he says, 'involves dispatching mobile agents from one computer and delivering them to a remote computer for execution.' While hailing the potential of this new generation of agent technology, Nolle seems skeptical about our ability to prepare for and handle its emergence, particularly because of flaws in the agent research community."
The main problem with traditional AI research has been an overstating of the possibilities. Natural language processing isn't as far off as most people think it is, but when it hits, people are going to criticize it by saying "why doesn't it understand me when I say 'lol, r u 4 reals?'?".
Most AI talk is marketing hype, but the main idea to keep in mind when discussing AI is, as one of my lecturers said "AI, after it has been developed, is no longer AI". Think the minimax algorithm, when it was first used in chess, it was groundbreaking AI. Now it is considered a boring and obvious mathematical process.
Another problem is that most scenarios people think "need" AI can be solved using standard processes. I don't need an agent to "(an ISA) making sure you don't get fast food restaurant references when you need a poet's name" (from TFA), I just type in "Poet" as another search query.
I am a little biased, as I plan to move into smart computing after Uni, but there is a lot of good people doing good research into AI. It is a pity that most only see the marketing fluff and past overestimates by a few vocal researchers, rather then the good work being done by most in the field.