WILL AI ELIMINATE OUR JOBS? - DTNS WEEKLY TECH UPDATE 1/19/2017
Added 2017-01-19 20:09:52 +0000 UTCHey all, thanks for reading! This is the weekly newsletter companion to Daily Tech News Show at http://dailytechnewsshow.com/
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A lot of people in our chat room, email, and Slack are concerned about what will happen to jobs if we automate things with AI. And it's not just AI. All kinds of technology worries people when they think about their employment. So this week I take a look at what we should and shouldn't be concerned about regarding the robots taking our jobs. But first a recap of the week's tech news.
NEWS
The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has closed its investigation into the death of Joshua Brown in a crash while using Tesla’s Autopilot feature. It found that Brown should have seen the tractor trailer 7 seconds before impact and, “should have been able to take some action before the crash, like braking, steering or attempting to avoid the vehicle. He took none of those actions." The report also found that crash rates for Tesla vehicles dropped by 40 percent after Autopilot was installed. The agency will not seek a recall. http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/19/14326604/tesla-autopilot-crash-driver-seven-seconds-inattentive-nhtsa
Sources told Reuters that according to the company's internal investigation, Samsung Galaxy Note 7 fires were the result of the battery. Samsung has reportedly replicated the issue, and determined that the cause was not the result of hardware design, or software implementation. The source advised that the result of Samsung's investigation will be revealed on January 23rd a day before the Q4 earnings call. Koh Dong-jin, head of Samsung's mobile division, is expected to reveal the results. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-samsung-elec-smartphones-idUSKBN150019
The Seoul Central District Court rejected a request for a warrant to arrest Samsung Group head Jay Y. Lee on suspicion of bribery, embezzlement and perjury. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-politics-samsung-lee-idUSKBN1522UY
Google has acquired Twitter’s mobile app developer platform called Fabric, crash reporting system called Crashlytics, mobile app analytics called Answers, the Digits SMS login system and development automation system called FastLane. Twitter launched Fabric in 2014 and it now serves 580,000 developers reaching 2.5 billion users. Google will continue to run Fabric and its related tools as part of Google’s Developer Products Group. Crashlytics will become Firebase’s main crash reporting tool. --- Crashlytics founders Jeff Seibert and Wayne Chang will leave Twitter though not go to Google. Rich Paret will lead the team that is going to Google. https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/18/google-twitter-fabric/
Netflix announced it earned $0.15 per share in Q4 with revenue of $2.48 billion. Analysts had expected earnings per share of $0.14 and revenue of $2.47 billion. Notably the company saw very strong growth in subscribers across all markets. In the US, 2 million new subscribers were added in Q4, with 5 million added internationally. This well exceeded analyst expectations of 1.38 million and 3.78 million, respectively. The company has focused on adding international content that can travel across regions to continue this growth, like the original Brazilian series 3%, as well as Japanese anime and Turkish dramas. Reed Hastings in shareholder letter cited an unconfirmed report about the BBC, writing “The BBC has become the first major linear network to announce plans to go binge-first with new seasons, favoring internet over linear viewers. We presume HBO is not far behind the BBC.” Netflix said it also did not expect changes to net neutrality policy in the US to materially affect it, though it still supports the open internet guidelines for the benefit of smaller companies. https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/18/netflix-blows-out-the-fourth-quarter-after-setting-itself-up-for-a-huge-end-of-the-year/
Microsoft is buying Maluuba, a Montreal and Waterloo-based company that specializes in natural language processing. Yoshua Bengio, professor of computer science and operations research at the University of Montreal, will stay on as an advisor after the acquisition. Bengio is known for his work in deep learning and neural networks. Maluuba's co-founders Sam Pasupalak and Kaheer Suleman noted Microsoft’s Azure cloud infrastructure as one of the key reasons for joining Microsoft. Microsoft recently formed an AI research group led by executive vice president Harry Shum who said he is looking forward to working with Bengio. http://fortune.com/2017/01/13/microsoft-montreal-ai-company/
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in court Tuesday in the legal fight between Zenimax and Facebook-owned Oculus. Zenimax claims former employee John Carmack took proprietary information with him to Oculus. Zuckerberg told the court “Oculus products are based on Oculus technology,” and claimed he had never heard of ZeniMax before. Regarding VR, Zuckerberg said ""We want to get closer to this kind of perfect representation, so you can capture a moment you had."" Zuckerberg also said that Facebook wanted to move quickly and planned to vet Oculus legally on a Friday and sign the deal on a Monday. And Zuckerberg said, while under oath, that the Facebook motto “Move fast and break things” has been retired and replaced by “move fast and build stable infrastructure." https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/17/zuckerberg-testifies-in-2-billion-lawsuit-that-oculus-did-not-steal-core-vr-tech/
A US federal appeals court in San Francisco ruled Thursday that a consumers have standing to pursue a class-action lawsuit against Apple as direct purchasers of apps. The complaint, filed in 2011 alleged Apple violated U.S. antitrust law by prohibiting apps from outside the Apple app store. The case has only gained the right to pursue class-action status, it has not yet been granted that status. Apple had convinced the lowqer court to follow a 1977 Supreme Court ruling that bars consumers from recovering damages from a company if it doesn’t directly sell its products to consumers. The appeals court ruled iPhone users are direct consumers of content in the App store. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-12/apple-must-face-consumer-lawsuit-over-iphone-apps-monopoly
The CIA has posted almost 12 million declassified documents online covering 50 years intelligence reports, briefings and more. The documents include discussions about assassinating Fidel Castro, details of Nazi war crimes, reports of UFO sightings, and a study into human telepathy dubbed ""Project Star Gate."" Most documents more than 25 years old have been automatically declassified since 1995, but previously were only available on four computers located in the US National Archives in Maryland. The database is known as CREST (CIA Records Search Tool). http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/18/14307198/cia-secret-files-crest-online-database
The US FTC has filed a lawsuit claiming Qualcomm maintained an illegal monopoly for mobile phone chips and charged customers artificially elevated royalties. Among the charges are that Qualcomm prevented Apple from using competitors chips. Qualcomm can withhold licensing of essential patents if customers do not agree to its terms. Qualcomm is appealing a South Korean fine of 1.03 trillion won (US$890 million) levied last month and is under investigation in Europe and Taiwan as well. In a press release, Qualcomm said it, "has never withheld or threatened to withhold chip supply in order to obtain agreement to unfair or unreasonable licensing terms. The FTC’s allegation to the contrary -- the central thesis of the complaint -- is wrong." https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-17/qualcomm-forced-apple-to-exclusively-use-modem-chips-ftc-says
China’s Cyberspace Administration has ordered mobile app stores to register with the administration immediately. Third party app stores predominate on Chinese phones and often spread malware. The registration requirement will also prevent the spread of illegal information. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-38637687
The Wall Street Journal reports its sources say investors in Snap, Inc's forthcoming IPO will not receive voting shares. This would leave co-founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy with 70% of the voting power while holding only 45% of the company's stock. The company also issued these dilluted shares in more recent private funding rounds. Since 2012, 19% of tech companies went public with these dual-class stock offerings. http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-snap-ipo-new-investors-to-get-zero-votes-while-founders-keep-control-1484568034
At the National Retail Federations Big Show conference Monday, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich announced the Responsive Retail Platform or RRP. RRP is an Internet of Things platform meant to connect retail hardware, software, APIs, and sensors in a standardized way. The platform uses Intel’s low-power integrated sensor with RFID to track inventory and generate in-store data. It will eventually incorporate third-party sensors as well. It runs on an open source analytics platform-as-a-service from independent software vendors. Intel plans to invest more than $100 million in retail over the next five years. http://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-launches-new-iot-retail-platform-plans-100-million-retail-tech-investment/
CLOSER LOOK - TECH AND JOBS
There's a lot of worry about technology replacing jobs and I want to work through a few things I think are often misunderstood about this sort of thing. This doesn't mean there aren't some real concerns of course, but it's always good to identify what the real concerns are.
WHEN A MACHINE REPLACES A HUMAN
First of all a machine automating the duties of a person doesn't immediately eliminate that person's job. It changes their duties.
Think about the offices of the 1960s. They were filled with desks full of secretaries and assistants doing drudge work like putting figures in ledgers and physical spreadsheets, filing, making copies, and delivering memos. When those tasks began being taken up by computers you might expect the office to empty out and only the directors and executives to be left with everyone else out of work. But that's not what happened. Some secretaries were still needed to administrate an executives schedule. But more significantly companies found they could now afford to pay people to do things they couldn't afford before. So the rise of project managers, coordinators, developers and such filled that office space with more productive people.
And this is an essential concept. When a machine automates a process the company shouldn't immediately just eliminate the job that covered those duties and pocket the savings. It often is better for that company to invest that savings into people doing things the company couldn't afford before that will improve the bottom line.
For instance, let's say an assistant for an executive made $20,000 a year doing drudge work like routing memos and filling in ledgers. Let's say that admittedly oversimplified executive team generates $500,000 in revenue for the company. Then let's say the PC comes along and replaces those duties. You could get rid of the assistant and see revenue of $520,000. Or you could have the assistant now make $30,000 to oversee some lower level projects, contribute more ideas, and free the executive up to pursue new deals and projects. Let's say that leads to $75,000 in new revenue. You end up increasing company revenue, raising the salary of the worker and improving overall productivity without losing a job.
I can already imagine cynics saying that certain companies are too short-sighted and will just eliminate jobs and pocket the savings. If that's true, and the industry is competitive, their competitors will seize the opportunity to take advantage of the increased productivity and hire people away.
For a more modern example look at customer service. We perceive customer service as rotten because companies can't afford to pay people to provide the individual attention you need, since there are too many customers who have needs. With machine learning taking over the easy tasks however, customer service agents could provide service that wasn't affordable before, increase customer satisfaction, and raise revenue. All without losing jobs.
Even so, not every industry has such a logical transition. Take drivers. Whether you're talking about cabs, trucks or Uber, an autonomous car takes the driver out of the equation. It's possible that ancillary logistical positions or customer service positions could be filled by some drivers, but being a driver is often a job someone takes because it doesn't require retraining. You got laid off so you drove a cab for awhile. You lost your job at the factory so began driving a semi.
That's why a solid educational system is so important. Community colleges and retraining programs can take people from one career to another. It's one of the big differences between the industrial revolution and the computer revolution. When a factory worker was replaced by a steam engine, the workers became luddites and saboteurs because they had no options. When computers replaced desk workers they were more likely to have skills and education to transition to other roles because the educational system had improved.
Here technology can help too. More education is available to more people at lower cost than ever before through online courses and resources.
And another factor to consider is the ability to set up an independent business of one's own. The same technology that eliminates duties for large companies can make it much more practical and affordable to start one's own business. Think about the people who couldn't afford to start an antique store when you had to advertise, rent a storefront and hope people traveled to yo to shop. Ebay came long and made it possible to run an antique store (or lots of other kinds of stores) out of one's home with a large chunk of the world as your market.
Daily Tech News Show is another example. To do this show in the 1970s I would need a radio transmitter, engineers, salespeople, and aggressive marketing plus the permission of cities and possibly networks. Today I need an internet connection and one other person to help put things together. The point being technology has made lots of opportunities available for people that didn't exist even while it eliminates other roles.
NOT ALL ROSES
None of this is meant to deny there will be problems. There will. People will be in situations where it will be hard to find a new job or where learning or re-training just aren't realistic options. We need to pay attention to those needs. But we also need to take an accurate assessment of what the disruption actually will be in order to know what resources we can bring to bear.
But my main point in this column is to point out that it's not as simple as AI replaces jobs and people are out of work. Nothing's ever that simple.
