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Steins;Gate Series Anime to the Rescue 🙀😹🙉

What's in store for 21st century technology? Can you even begin to imagine it? To shed some light, IBM Japan joined forces with Steins;Gate—a four-part Japanese anime series that follows a crew of quirky time-traveling teenagers who utilize sci-fi cognitive computing devices to get out of everyday troubles. Warning, these guys are out there...in an endearing way of course. One character even carries around apricot puree in case he “finds a girlfriend and she wants to cook something.” Don’t ask, just watch →

"Pass the computerized condiment, please." 

Look out ketchup and mustard. We’ve gone back to the cognitive kitchen to create Bengali Butternut BBQ Sauce, an unexpected blend of squash, Thai chilies, tamarind and a dozen more ingredients that have never before been slathered together on a chicken wing.

It’s got a slow, warm heat and a kick that becomes even more to savor when you discover that it was concocted by something that has no taste buds.  Cognitive computers from IBM Research modeled quintillions of recipes based on thousands of ingredient combinations to predict what new tastes people would find surprising and delicious. And voilà!

The sauce was only bottled for a limited run, but you can whip up a batch at home with this recipe. We even added a label to print. Bon appétit.

So you read the word, ‘bow.’ How does your brain know it’s the front of a ship, a violin accessory, a knot, a bend of the upper body or an arrow launcher? Looking at the context of the sentences around it helps. And Watson is starting a new kind of conversation between people and machine by parsing natural language similar to the way we do.

Watson at your service

“One moment, please.” “We’ll be with you shortly.” “You are eighth in the queue.” Sound all too familiar? Maybe not for long—The Watson Engagement Advisor can listen to customer queries, suggest personalized follow up questions and help operators find answers in a flash. For even faster service, callers can interact directly with Watson itself. Could this also mean an end to the need for mind-numbing “hold music?” (One can only hope.)

There’s a ton of information out there today, but bringing all of it to bear at the moment it’s needed is very difficult. Watson helps people make better informed decisions in the moments that matter, which can translate into better healthcare, better research, better customer service…. there are too many possibilities to list.

INSIDE THE INVENTIVE MIND Kim Reheiser Program Director IBM Watson Solutions 

Keeping up with the quirks, dialects and double meanings of English is a daunting task for any brain, let alone an electronic one. But with its uncanny ability to understand our tweets, comments and articles, IBM Watson can catch your drift and hit you back with the straight 411.

What’s What with Watson 

1. What is IBM Watson? IBM Watson is technology unlike any other that's come before. By using its natural language capabilities to understand the complex nuances of everyday English, Watson can accurately analyze massive amounts of data and help people make more informed, evidence-based decisions.

2. How did it get its name? Watson was named after Thomas J. Watson, who worked at IBM for 42 years and served as chairman from 1949 to 1956. He built a worldwide industry over the many years he led the company and penned the “THINK” motto, which is still a widely known symbol of IBM.

"Drawing from all kinds of information sources, Watson will power a whole new generation of cognitive apps — they’ll understand natural language, sense, hypothesize, constantly learn and confidently react and respond with contextual wisdom.” INSIDE THE INVENTIVE MIND Swami Chandrasekaran Executive Architect IBM Watson Solutions

TED-Ed teams up with IBM Researcher Eric Brown to illustrate a lesson on The New Era of Cognitive Computing →

Anyone who’s searched the Internet knows that computers can have a tough time understanding the meaning of our words. Now IBM Watson is bridging the gap between language arts and computer science. It acts like a built-in human interpreter for computers, translating the meaning of our words into the right 1’s and 0’s. And the more Watson reads, the more fluent it gets.

“Watson is the beginning of a new era of computing, changing the human-machine relationship. With its ability to consume the ever growing ocean of unstructured data, it opens the door for organizations to build an entirely new class of business solutions that were once labeled as extremely complex or even fantasy.” INSIDE THE INVENTIVE MIND Swami Chandrasekaran Executive Architect IBM Watson Solutions

"There are a lot of new areas to tackle in the technology space, and in the industries and types of problems we tackle. I really believe we are just scratching the surface, and I can’t wait to see what Watson will transform next." INSIDE THE INVENTIVE MIND Leanne LeBlanc Product Manager IBM Watson Solutions

Some snaps from outside IBM Watson's new Silicon Alley address, via IBM on Instagram 

New digs. New gigs.  Catching up with IBM Watson.

Born in the research lab. Tested on Jeopardy! Now IBM Watson is off to the real world. Able to understand natural language and filter oceans of data, Watson will transform the speed and accuracy in which everyone from surgeons to shopaholics get insights and answers. Follow along and glimpse the dawn of the cognitive computer age.

Computer science lab turned art studio? Connectivity of a Cognitive Computer Based on the Macaque Brain, an illustration by IBM Research, earns first place in Wired's Best Science and Engineering Visualizations of 2012.

(Thanks WIRED!)