INQUISITR.COM / News & Politics

Compass News App Just Latest Example Of Ever-Improving AI

By Anthony Carranza
Published on: 04:14 PST, Mar 2, 2018

The conversation around AI has been heating up at the present time. The advances in consumer technology, data, analytics, smartphones, and others have opened the doors to creating AI programs. The latest trend in utilizing new technology is the Compass News app, which focuses on news stories and is driven by AI.

The Compass News app was designed initially for college-aged readers who are not major news consumers. In other words, it presents the user with a short summary in a card-like format. The news-dedicated platform has amassed 50,000 users in a 10-month period in the U.K. The startup is looking to expand in the United States.

The Compass News app has added AI technology to its app. In a detailed report from the Nieman Journalism Lab, it explains how a group of editors is working with the AI model for this particular project.

“Compass News’ story selection process has become increasingly driven by artificial intelligence. For months, the company has trained an AI editor to observe the Compass News editors so as to mimic their curation decisions at scale, particularly when those humans are off the clock.”

AI has grown over the past few years because it has become more affordable in terms of cost. According to Forbes, several technology companies from Silicon Valley have made AI accessible to the marketplace.

“Once the sole domain of the Silicon Valley elite, AI technology is fast and furiously being deployed to the masses. Technology giants such as Microsoft, Google, Amazon and IBM are open-sourcing their technology, making it freely available to developers or at a lower cost than previously available to advance the technology forward.”

Elsewhere, the year 2018 will have plenty to talk about AI and its uses in the different sectors. As reported by Entrepreneur, heavy spending by the private sector (Alphabet and Baidu) and government pursuit of AI technology pave the way for AI to be discussed and debated depending on its use.

“During the 2016 election, President Trump focused on globalization and immigration as causes of American job-loss, but during the 2018 midterm elections, the narrative could be about automation and artificial intelligence, as more working-class Americans struggle to adjust to the new landscape.”

Aside from the pouring of financial resources behind AI technology, newer inventions and applications have surfaced in different industries. For instance, an e-commerce site has recently launched a virtual gemologist to data mine the global diamond marketplace. What it does is calculate more than a million data points and deliver results based on consumer preferences.

Healthcare is also benefiting from AI applications. An example is the company Viz.ai, who markets algorithms to doctors and hospitals. According to Wired, the idea behind this AI program is to help stroke victims, specifically in providing treatment sooner and preventing brain tissue to die due to waiting for long periods of time. Another example is a program that scientists at Stanford have been developing that can let you know the exact day you will die. This applies to people who have terminal illnesses.

What is making AI possible is called machine learning. As defined by Harvard Business Review, ML is the machine’s ability to keep improving its performance without humans having to explain exactly how to accomplish all the tasks it’s given.

What is evident is that the deployment of AI technology has just started to scratch the surface. It is too early to know what this technology will do in the long run. When you look at the internal combustion engine it paved the way for inventions like cars, trucks, airplanes, chainsaws, and others. AI is just getting integrated into the process, and what kind of footprint it will leave is still being discovered.

Share this article: Compass News App Just Latest Example Of Ever-Improving AI
More from Inquisitr