[Web4lib] Watson - IBM's "question-answering" machine (potential implications for libraries?)

[Larry Schwartz]

Those who cannot remember old movies are condemned to repeat them as if 
they were their own ideas:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7Rq-PEW5qM

On 2/6/2011 11:26 AM, B.G. Sloan wrote:
>  From the New York Times:
>
> "I.B.M.’s groundbreaking question-answering system, running on roughly 2,500 parallel processor cores, each able to perform up to 33 billion operations a second, is playing a pair of 'Jeopardy!' matches against the show’s top two living players, to be aired on Feb. 14, 15 and 16."
>
> I'm definitely going to be tuning in to these Jeopardy episodes. I'm curious to see how well "Watson" does against two smart humans.
>
> Can't help but wonder about long-term implications for libraries, say, ten years down the road? What if we had sophisticated affordable "question-answering" machines in ten years? What would that mean for libraries?
>
> For some background, here's a link to an Op Ed piece in today's New York Times: http://nyti.ms/hXaoWX
>
> Bernie Sloan

-- 
Larry Schwartz, Librarian
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