Infinite AI Interns for Everybody — from wired.com by Matt Clifford; via Sam DeBrule
These assistants won’t just ease the workload, they’ll unleash a wave of entrepreneurship.

Excerpt:

Excitingly, though, there’s also a new generation of startups that are demonstrating that you don’t need a billion-dollar budget to get to the cutting edge of AI. Take Midjourney or Stability AI, applications which produce results that rival DALL-E, or Causaly (disclosure: I’m an investor), which allows scientists to find new causal relationships in life sciences with natural language questions. Then there is a growing list of new AI startups with impressive backers and more general ambitions, like Anthropic (an AI safety and research firm), Conjecture (which seeks to keep damaging factors such as racial bias out of AI), and Keen Technologies, which was founded by computer science legend John Carmack.

Just as the advent of the internet gave every startup a vastly scalable distribution engine, the era of AI superpowers will give every startup a vastly scalable production engine. 

 
 

What factors help active learning classrooms succeed? — from rtalbert.org Robert Talbert

Excerpt:

The idea that the space in which you do something, affects the thing you do is the basic premise behind active learning classrooms (ALCs).

The biggest message I get from this study is that in order to have success with active learning classrooms, you can’t just build them — they have to be introduced as part of an ecosystem that touches almost all parts of the daily function of a university: faculty teaching, faculty development and support, facilities, and the Registrar’s Office to name a few. Without that ecosystem before you build an ALC, it seems hard to have success with students after it’s built. You’re more likely to have an expensive showcase that looks good but ultimately does not fulfill its main purpose: Promoting and amplifying active learning, and moving the culture of a campus toward active engagement in the classroom.

From DSC:
Thank you Robert for your article/posting here! And thank you for being one of the few faculty members who:

  • Regularly share information out on LinkedIn, Twitter, and your blog (something that is all too rare for faculty members throughout higher education)
  • Took a sabbatical to go work at a company that designs and develops numerous options for implementing active learning setups throughout the worlds of higher education, K12 education, and the corporate world as well. You are taking your skills to help contribute to the corporate world, while learning things out in the corporate world, and then  taking these learnings back into the world of higher education.

This presupposes something controversial: That the institution will take a stand on the issue that there is a preferred way to teach, namely active learning, and that the institution will be moving toward making active learning the default pedagogy at the institution. Putting this stake in the ground, and then investing not only in facilities but in professional development and faculty incentives to make it happen, again calls for vigorous, sustained leadership — at the top, and especially by the teaching/learning center director.

Robert Talbert


 

Digital Trends’ Tech For Change CES 2023 Awards — from digitaltrends.com by Drew Prindle

Excerpt:

CES is more than just a neon-drenched show-and-tell session for the world’s biggest tech manufacturers. More and more, it’s also a place where companies showcase innovations that could truly make the world a better place — and at CES 2023, this type of tech was on full display. We saw everything from accessibility-minded PS5 controllers to pedal-powered smart desks. But of all the amazing innovations on display this year, these three impressed us the most…

Samsung's Relumino Mode helps those with low vision

Also relevant/see:

 

From DSC:
Check out the items below. As with most technologies, there are likely going to be plusses & minuses regarding the use of AI in digital video, communications, arts, and music.



Also see:


Also somewhat relevant, see:

 

94% of Consumers are Satisfied with Virtual Primary Care — from hitconsultant.net

Excerpt from What You Should Know (emphasis DSC):

  • For people who have used virtual primary care, the vast majority of them (94%) are satisfied with their experience, and nearly four in five (79%) say it has allowed them to take charge of their health. The study included findings around familiarity and experience with virtual primary care, virtual primary care and chronic conditions, current health and practices, and more.
  • As digital health technology continues to advance and the healthcare industry evolves, many Americans want the ability to utilize more digital methods when it comes to managing their health, according to a study recently released by Elevance Health — formerly Anthem, Inc. Elevance Health commissioned to conduct an online study of over 5,000 US adults age 18+ around virtual primary care.
 

From DSC:
For me, I wish politicians and legislators would stay out of the way and let public and private educators make the decisions. But if any politician is about to vote on significant education-related policies, laws, etc. — I would like to suggest that society require them to either:

  • teach a K12-based class for at least one month
    or
  • be in the classroom for the entire day to observe — and do this for at least one month 

Perhaps we would have far less standardized testing. Perhaps we would have far more joy and wonder — for the teachers as well as for the students. Perhaps lifelong learning — and the love of learning — would get the wind in its sails that it so desperately needs.
.


From DSC:
Along these lines of enjoyment in everyday things, could this type of thing happen more within education?

 

From DSC:
Check this confluence of emerging technologies out!

Also see:

How to spot AI-generated text — from technologyreview.com by Melissa Heikkilä
The internet is increasingly awash with text written by AI software. We need new tools to detect it.

Excerpt:

This sentence was written by an AI—or was it? OpenAI’s new chatbot, ChatGPT, presents us with a problem: How will we know whether what we read online is written by a human or a machine?

“If you have enough text, a really easy cue is the word ‘the’ occurs too many times,” says Daphne Ippolito, a senior research scientist at Google Brain, the company’s research unit for deep learning.

“A typo in the text is actually a really good indicator that it was human-written,” she adds.

7 Best Tech Developments of 2022 — from /thetechranch.comby

Excerpt:

As we near the end of 2022, it’s a great time to look back at some of the top technologies that have emerged this year. From AI and virtual reality to renewable energy and biotechnology, there have been a number of exciting developments that have the potential to shape the future in a big way. Here are some of the top technologies that have emerged in 2022:

 

How AI And 5G Could Lead The Next Phase Of The Industrial Revolution — from swisscognitive.ch

Some use cases of the convergence of AI and 5G are:

  • Metaverse: AI is a key technology that helps bring Metaverse to life and now with the addition of 5G, streaming experiences would become enjoyable and maintaining connectivity without any disruption of external factors like geographical locations would be eliminated.
  • Digital assistants in the form of chatbots and virtual avatars: Digital assistants today use AI to replicate the human brain and converse with people in human language by understanding intent. With 5G the speed at which the speech is converted to text will improve drastically.
  • Education: AI and 5G are helping bring education to students’ doorstep through virtual reality and is making this available, efficiently as in real-world classrooms. Solving queries is possible quickly without any restrictions. Betty in Archie Comics attending her classes virtually is a reality due to these technologies.
  • Healthcare: AI and 5G in healthcare are proliferating an accurate diagnosis of diseases, real-time monitoring, and quick treatment facilities. This has become possible with the right use of data- collection, transmission, and analysis.
  • Automotive: AI and 5G together is making vehicles smarter and reducing the risk of mishaps on roads by employing various data-powered safety and driving efficiency measures in vehicles.

AI Timelines: What Do Experts in Artificial Intelligence Expect for the Future? — from singularityhub.com by Dr. Max Roser

Excerpt:

What I do take away from these surveys however, is that the majority of AI experts take the prospect of very powerful AI technology seriously. It is not the case that AI researchers dismiss extremely powerful AI as mere fantasy.

The huge majority thinks that in the coming decades there is an even chance that we will see AI technology which will have a transformative impact on our world. While some have long timelines, many think it is possible that we have very little time before these technologies arrive. Across the three surveys more than half think that there is a 50% chance that a human-level AI would be developed before some point in the 2060s, a time well within the lifetime of today’s young people.

Future Of Health: Top Five Digital Health Innovations For 2023 — from forbes.com by Anita Gupta

Excerpts:

  • Connected Digital Care
  • AI In Healthcare
  • Real-World Patient Engagement In Healthcare
  • Increase Security For Digital And Health Data
  • Improving Telehealth Services

Looking ahead to 2023: AI, machine learning, RTLS and robotic process automation — from healthcareitnews.com by Bill Siwicki
These advanced technologies will do more to help provider organizations with workflow optimization, staff shortages and the patient experience in the year ahead, one expert predicts.

Three reasons why NLP will go mainstream in healthcare in 2023 — from healthcareitnews.com by Bill Siwicki
A natural language processing expert explains why he feels the technology’s kinks have been ironed out, its ROI has been proven and the timing is right for healthcare to take advantage of information-extraction tools.

13 tech predictions for 2023 — from enterprisersproject.com by Katie Sanders
What can you expect in the world of IT next year? Business and IT leaders share their thoughts

Analysts Predictions About AI In 2023 — from forbes.com by Gil Press

Excerpts:

  • Automated software development
  • Automated content and commerce
  • Enterprise governance, risk, sustainability and security
  • Consumer interactions and experiences

Top 5 Edge AI Trends to Watch in 2023 — from nvidia.com by Amanda Saunders

Excerpt:

Until now, AI has operated almost exclusively in the cloud. But increasingly diverse streams of data are being generated around the clock from sensors at the edge. These require real-time inference, which is leading more AI deployments to move to edge computing.

For airports, stores, hospitals and more, AI brings advanced efficiency, automation and even cost reduction, which is why edge AI adoption accelerated last year.

In 2023, expect to see a similarly challenging environment, which will drive the following edge AI trends.

Digital transformation: 5 trends to watch in 2023 — from enterprisersproject.com by Ritish Reddy
As enterprises continue to digitally transform, IT leaders must look toward the future. Expect to see these trends in 2023

 

The talent needed to adopt mobile AR in industry — from chieflearningofficer.com by Yao Huang Ph.D.

Excerpt:

Therefore, when adopting mobile AR to improve job performance, L&D professionals need to shift their mindset from offering training with AR alone to offering performance support with AR in the middle of the workflow.

The learning director from a supply chain industry pointed out that “70 percent of the information needed to build performance support systems already exists. The problem is it is all over the place and is available on different systems.”

It is the learning and development professional’s job to design a solution with the capability of the technology and present it in a way that most benefits the end users.

All participants revealed that mobile AR adoption in L&D is still new, but growing rapidly. L&D professionals face many opportunities and challenges. Understanding the benefits, challenges and opportunities of mobile AR used in the workplace is imperative.

A brief insert from DSC:
Augmented Reality (AR) is about to hit the mainstream in the next 1-3 years. It will connect the physical world with the digital world in powerful, helpful ways (and likely in negative ways as well). I think it will be far bigger and more commonly used than Virtual Reality (VR). (By the way, I’m also including Mixed Reality (MR) within the greater AR domain.) With Artificial Intelligence (AI) making strides in object recognition, AR could be huge.

Learning & Development groups should ask for funding soon — or develop proposals for future funding as the new hardware and software products mature — in order to upskill at least some members of their groups in the near future.

As within Teaching & Learning Centers within higher education, L&D groups need to practice what they preach — and be sure to train their own people as well.

 

Understanding the Overlap Between UDL and Digital Accessibility — from boia.org

Excerpt:

Implementing UDL with a Focus on Accessibility
UDL is a proven methodology that benefits all students, but when instructors embrace universal design, they need to consider how their decisions will affect students with disabilities.

Some key considerations to keep in mind:

  • Instructional materials should not require a certain type of sensory perception.
  • A presentation that includes images should have accurate alternative text (also called alt text) for those images.
  • Transcripts and captions should be provided for all audio content.
  • Color alone should not be used to convey information, since some students may not perceive color (or have different cultural understandings of colors).
  • Student presentations should also follow accessibility guidelines. This increases the student’s workload, but it’s an excellent opportunity to teach the importance of accessibility.
 

From DSC:
I received an email the other day re: a TytoCare Exam Kit. It said (with some emphasis added by me):

With a TytoCare Exam Kit connected to Spectrum Health’s 24/7 Virtual Urgent Care, you and your family can have peace of mind and a quick, accurate diagnosis and treatment plan whenever you need it without having to leave your home.

Your TytoCare Exam Kit will allow your provider to listen to your lungs, look inside your ears or throat, check your temperature, and more during a virtual visit.

Why TytoCare?

    • Convenience – With a TytoCare Exam Kit and our 24/7/365 On-Demand Virtual Urgent Care there is no drive, no waiting room, no waiting for an appointment.
    • Peace of Mind – Stop debating about whether symptoms are serious enough to do something about them.
    • Savings – Without the cost of gas or taking off work, you get the reliable exams and diagnosis you need. With a Virtual Urgent Care visit you’ll never pay more than $50. That’s cheaper than an in-person urgent care visit, but the same level of care.

From DSC:
It made me reflect on what #telehealth has morphed into these days. Then it made me wonder (again), what #telelegal might become in the next few years…? Hmmm. I hope the legal field can learn from the healthcare industry. It could likely bring more access to justice (#A2J), increased productivity (for several of the parties involved), as well as convenience, peace of mind, and cost savings.


 

 

TL;DR: Women prefer text contributions over talk in remote classes — from highereddive.com by Laura Spitalniak (BTW, TL;DR: is short for “too long; didn’t read”)

Dive Brief (emphasis DSC):

  • Female students show a stronger preference for contributing to remote classes via text chat than their male counterparts, according to peer-reviewed research published in PLOS One, an open-access journal.
  • Researchers also found all students were more likely to use the chat function to support or amplify their peers’ comments than to diminish them.
  • Given these findings, the researchers suggested incorporating text chats into class discussions could boost female participation in large introductory science classrooms, where women are less likely to participate than men.
 

Making a Digital Window Wall from TVs — from theawesomer.com

Drew Builds Stuff has an office in the basement of his parents’ house. Because of its subterranean location, it doesn’t get much light. To brighten things up, he built a window wall out of three 75? 4K TVs, resulting in a 12-foot diagonal image. Since he can load up any video footage, he can pretend to be anywhere on Earth.

From DSC:
Perhaps some ideas here for learning spaces!

 

Principals Give Thanks—and Shoutouts—to School Support Staff — from edweek.org by Denisa R. Superville

Excerpt:

Schools run, in part, on the elbow grease of custodians, the gentle nudge of a crossing guard, and the encouraging smile of a paraprofessional and teacher’s assistant silently indicating to a student that, “Yes, you’ve got this.”

 
© 2024 | Daniel Christian