Origins of Machine learning

 a quick trip through time to examine the origins of machine learning as well as the most recent milestones.

1950 — Alan Turing creates the “Turing Test” to determine if a computer has real intelligence. To pass the test, a computer must be able to fool a human into believing it is also human.

1952 — Arthur Samuel wrote the first computer learning program. The program was the game of checkers, and the IBM computer improved at the game the more it played, studying which moves made up winning strategies and incorporating those moves into its program.

1957 — Frank Rosenblatt designed the first neural network for computers (the perceptron), which simulate the thought processes of the human brain.

1967 — The “nearest neighbor” algorithm was written, allowing computers to begin using very basic pattern recognition. This could be used to map a route for traveling salesmen, starting at a random city but ensuring they visit all cities during a short tour. 

1979 — Students at Standford University invent the “Standford Cart” which can navigate obstacles in a room on its own.

1981 — Gerald Dejong introduces the concept of Explanation Based Learning (EBL), in which a computer analyses training data and creates a general rule it can follow by discarding unimportant data.

1985 — Terry Sejnowski invents NetTalk, which learns to pronounce words the same way a baby does.

1990s — Work on machine learning shifts from a knowledge-driven approach to a data-driven approach.  Scientists begin creating programs for computers to analyze large amounts of data and draw conclusions — or “learn” — from the results.

1997 — IBM’s Deep Blue beats the world champion at chess.

2006 — Geoffrey Hinton coins the term “deep learning” to explain new algorithms that let computers “see” and distinguish objects and text in images and videos.

2010 — The Microsoft Kinect can track 20 human features at a rate of 30 times per second, allowing people to interact with the computer via movements and gestures.

2011 — IBM’s Watson beats its human competitors at Jeopardy.

2011 — Google Brain is developed, and its deep neural network can learn to discover and categorize objects much the way a cat does.

2012 – Google’s X Lab develops a machine learning algorithm that is able to autonomously browse YouTube videos to identify the videos that contain cats.

2014 – Facebook develops DeepFace, a software algorithm that is able to recognize or verify individuals on photos to the same level as humans can.

2015 – Amazon launches its own machine learning platform.

2015 – Microsoft creates the Distributed Machine Learning Toolkit, which enables the efficient distribution of machine learning problems across multiple computers.

2015 – Over 3,000 AI and Robotics researchers, endorsed by Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak (among many others), sign an open letter warning of the danger of autonomous weapons which select and engage targets without human intervention.

2016 – Google’s artificial intelligence algorithm beats a professional player at the Chinese bioard game Go, which is considered the world’s most complex board game and is many times harder than chess. The AlphaGo algorithm developed by Google DeepMind managed to win five games out of five in the Go competition.

Emoji - History

Emoji were initially used by Japanese mobile operators, NTT DoCoMo, au, and SoftBank Mobile (formerly Vodafone). These companies each defined their own variants of emoji using proprietary standards. The first emoji was created in 1998 or 1999 in Japan by Shigetaka Kurita,^[12] who was part of the team working on NTT DoCoMo's i-mode mobile Internet platform. Kurita took inspiration from weather forecasts that used symbols to show weather, Chinese characters and street signs, and from manga that used stock symbols to express emotions, such as lightbulbs signifying inspiration.^[13][14][15] The first set of 176 12×12 pixel emoji was created as part of i-mode's messaging features to help facilitate electronic communication, and to serve as a distinguishing feature from other services.^[5] Kurita created the first 180 emoji based on the expressions that he observed people making and other things in the city.^[16]

Originally meaning pictograph, the word emoji comes from Japanese e (絵, "picture") + moji (文字, "character"). 

Gantt chart

WHAT IS A GANTT CHART? ADVANTAGES, LIMITATIONS OF GANTT CHART

What is project management all about?

The answer to above question has evolved over the period. Initially it was merely considered as a process to manage time, resources and cost. A project manager would be rated good if s/he was able to complete project on time, within budget and of a desired quality. A seasoned project managers would apply their skills to optimise resource allocation, better stakeholder management and reduce the project cost.

Project management these days is expected to become part of the strategic initiatives for a sustainable business. Project management has moved up in the value chain with project management office (PMO), strategic project management, active customer engagement, etc. The underlying principles of project management have remained the same: it is still about defining project objectives, having a clear project charter, scope documents, planning a project timeline, identifying and assigning resources, optimising costs, managing issues, risks and change requests.

Even today when someone mentions project management, it is perceived as if he is talking about project planning and specifically about project timeline. By far the most popular and commonly used project timeline tool is Gantt chart. Let’s look at what is Gantt chart and why it is still popular.

What Is a Gantt Chart?

A Gantt chart is a visual presentation used in project management to show overview of timeline for project activities and their inter-dependence. Each project task or activity is represented with a bar chart clearly displaying start and end date. Thus the length of the bar shows the duration required for a task to complete. This way multiple tasks when displayed as bar charts, shows work breakdown structure on a timeline. Essentially Gantt chart shows when an activity starts, completes, how long it will take to complete an activities and also overall project, which is a project schedule.

Brief History

Gantt chart is a legacy left behind by Henry Laurence Gantt in 1910. Henry Gantt was a mechanical engineer, management consultant and industry expert. He introduced Gantt chart to visualise schedule and actual progress of projects. Its first major implementation or usage was well known – World War One (WW1) when US army used Gantt charts to manage arms production and logistic projects.

Henry Gantt experimented with Gantt chart and presented variations of it. The Gantt chart we see and use today (along with task dependencies) was introduced by Wallace Clark. Interestingly Wallace Clark used to work in Henry Gantt’s company and was considered as Henry Gantt’s disciple.

Gantt Chart Importance

here have been few tools or techniques used to identify and manage project activities before Gantt chart came into existence such as

• Message board
• Post-It boards
• To Do lists/Task lists

However these tools and techniques could not give a better picture about a project schedule. And this is where Gantt chart stands out.

• It shows breakdown structure
• It shows dependencies
• It shows expected timeline
• It shows current progress
• It shows schedule baseline
• It shows resources assigned
• It shows task priority
• It shows critical path
• It shows smallest as well as longest task

Advantages of Gantt Chart

There are distinct advantages of a Gantt chart, primarily from project manager, project stakeholderperspective. It is easy for stakeholder’s to understand the timeline, it brings clarity to everyone: when a project is going to start and expected to complete, team can manage its time accordingly, it also establishes accountability among stakeholders, it enables team to better coordinate project activities thereby enabling team to improving overall efficiency.

• It is easy to understand
• It gives clarity of dates
• It enables time management
• It brings efficiency
• It ensures accountability in terms of timeline
• It expects coordination among stakeholders in order to deliver things as per Gantt timeline

Disadvantage of Gantt Chart

However Gantt chart has its own limitations. Let’s look at those briefly.

• Tedious if one need to keep it updating regularly
• Can become for detailed project plan
• Unclear amount of work expected
• Not easy to view everything on a single paper

Steps to Create a Gantt Chart

In order to create Gantt chart, first project manager needs to identify high level tasks, then break those down into smaller actionable subtasks. Further he can identify efforts and duration required for those smaller set of tasks, link, sequence project tasks. And now it’s a time to plot bar chart against each of the task. Fortunately we don’t have to use pen and paper to draw Gantt chart, neither we have to use spreadsheet for the same. Project management tools like ZilicusPM make it easier for project manager to create Gantt chart easily. Interactive Gantt chart makes it even simpler

Should You Use Gantt Chart? Why?

There are reasons to use Gantt chart for a project manager to consider

• Better Visibility
• Greater Clarity
• Ease of Understanding
• Better Time Management
• Better Coordination

Lady Justice statue - Origin & Symbolism

Origins of the Lady Justice Statue

Some of the first images similar to the Lady of Justice date back to the Egyptian goddess Maat, who signified truth and order in that ancient society. Later, the ancient Greeks worshipped the goddess Themis, the personification of divine law and custom, and her daughter, Dike, whose name means “justice.” Dike was always depicted carrying a pair of balance scales, and it was believed that she ruled over human law.

The ancient Romans revered Justitia or lustitia, who most closely resembles the Lady of Justice statues formed in more modern times. She represented the morality of the justice system.

The Symbols of Justice

Balance Scales: These represent impartiality and the obligation of the law (through its representatives) to weigh the evidence presented to the court. Each side of a legal case needs to be looked at and comparisons made as justice is done.

Sword: This item symbolizes enforcement and respect, and means that justice stands by its decision and ruling, and is able to take action. The fact that the sword is unsheathed and very visible is a sign that justice is transparent and is not an implement of fear. A double-edged blade signifies that justice can rule against either of the parties once the evidence has been perused, and it is bound to enforce the ruling as well as protect or defend the innocent party.

Blindfold: This first appeared on a Lady Justice statue in the 16th century, and has been used intermittently since then. Apparently its original significance was that the judicial system was tolerating abuse or ignorance of aspects of the law. However, in modern times, the blindfold represents the impartiality and objectivity of the law and that it doesn’t let outside factors, such as politics, wealth or fame, influence its decisions.

WEIRD Problem in data collection

Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, And Democratic

The wounds of Honour are self inflicted

Path dependence

Path dependence is the idea that decisions we are faced with depend on past knowledge trajectory and decisions made, and are thus limited by the current competence base.

In other words, history matters for current decision-making situations and has a strong influence on strategic planning. Competences that have been built in the past define the option range for today’s moves. New business opportunities, in particular those based on technological progress, emerge gradually as a consequence of competencies acquired prior to new discoveries and over time.

Example

A well-known example is the QWERTY layout for typewriters. Despite the fact that different keyboard layouts in modern computer keyboards would allow faster typing, the QWERTY layout prevails. Due to the network effect (network externalities) the layout seems immutable.[1]

network effect

A network effect (also known as a network externality) exists when a product’s value to the user increases as the number of users of the product grows. The classic example is the telephone. The more people own telephones, the more valuable the telephone network is to each owner. If there are N owners, each one of them can call the other N - 1 owners: a total of N(N-1) communications can be made. Thus the network’s value grows with the number of possible connections, in the order of N squared. This insight is the basis of Metcalfe’s law that states that the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of members within the network.

When you buy a DVD player and some DVDs, you encourage an industry, and thus more DVDs are put on the market. In fact, the concept can easily extend: perhaps the most dominant network effect is language. If you write a web page in Inuktitut, not many people can read it. If your only audience is that community, that is fine. But if you want to get attention, you will probably write it in English: scientific journals, for example, are now overwhelmingly in English, especially because the internet amplifies network effects.

Network effects have fundamental importance for business strategy, intellectual property, and technical change in a wide range of industries. For instance, it becomes very important to establish early on in a market. [1]

Example

Amazon lost money for years establishing itself as the main source for online books, in direct competition to Barnes & Noble and eventually driving Borders out of the market.

Over time, positive network effects made the network more valuable and the business more succesful.