The Future of Intelligent Assistants

Today, we can talk to objects in our homes that recognize our voices, understand our questions, model our behaviors, and even predict our needs while communicating across vast networks of machines, computers, and distant humans. This is made possible by global supply chains optimized to produce the supercomputers in our pockets, and by the most valuable companies on the planet advancing software on the new wave of AI. Amazon has shipped almost 20 million Echo devices, which holds their personal learning system, Alexa. Apple announced HomePod with Siri, with similar offerings from Google and Microsoft. All of them target the living and put their AIs at the center of their networks. This is the new battle for the human interface. Search queries, entertainment, appliance commands, appointments, and purchases—the digital giants are trying to remove as much friction as possible between our wallets, our data, and their servers. And in doing so, they’re wrapping their ecosystems around everything we do. Amazon has a first-mover advantage, with numerous partners integrating Alexa including Spotify, Philips Hue, August locks, and most recently, Mercedes Benz and BMW. Google wants your login to follow you across Chrome, Gmail, Android, Google Home, and other partner touchpoints. Your Apple ID knows what you look like, how your voice sounds, and who and what you commonly interact with. Nest Cam uses facial recognition to know who’s at the door or in the living room and to provision them with access, personalized media, lighting, and heating. All of these solutions arise from the convergence of cheap sensing, connectivity, computation, and machine intelligence, and rely on high-resolution models of our behaviors. Data truly is the new oil, illustrated by the simple fact that the world’s most valuable businesses are no longer energy companies—they’re data companies. We’re shifting into a world of pervasive measurement and of socializing with increasingly human-like machine intelligences. The benefits could be enormous if our homes were more sensitive and responsive to activity and environmental conditions. Energy and resource footprints could be optimized if rooms knew when they were empty and adjusted lighting and air conditioning accordingly. Solutions like Neurio could integrate with renewable power systems and weather forecasts to predict demand. The intelligent home could sense our state of psychological or physical well-being and modify the ambience, prescribe exercise, or predict illness. These benefits rely on our willingness to allow our lives to be continuously observed and evaluated by unseen third parties in exchange for convenience and efficiency. Regulatory discussions are already heating up about data rights and security. Apple is positioning itself as the safe and private option, trying to keep all data collection and processing in our hands rather than its cloud. However, this sets up a dynamic in which privacy goes to those who can afford it, while the rest of us get access to the cheap seats in exchange for giving up the minutia of our lives. The arc of human progress is driven by finding better solutions and then dealing with their unanticipated consequences. We’re quite malleable to digital systems: think of how we now enter search queries or modify our speech in text. How might we be shaped by machine intelligence that sees more of the world than we do?