Category: Technology and Strategy
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On August 11, MIT Nobel laureate economist Daron Acemoglu published his latest book, What Happened to Liberal Democracy?: Remaking a Politics of Shared Prosperity. For much of the second half of the 20th century, liberal democracy appeared to be remarkably successful. Economic growth raised living standards across broad segments of society, technological advances created new…
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Artificial intelligence is rapidly spreading across the enterprise. Employees are using AI tools to improve their productivity, companies are launching pilots across a growing number of business functions, and executives are investing heavily in AI initiatives. Yet for most organizations, a major gap remains between experimenting with AI and making it a core operational capability.…
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Artificial intelligence is often discussed in terms of faster economic growth, higher productivity, and greater corporate profits. But those are not the only outcomes that matter. Another very important question is whether AI will actually improve human welfare by broadening opportunity, strengthening institutions, and raising living standards across society. That question is at the heart…
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When I began writing a weekly blog in May of 2005, I expected that artificial intelligence would someday become one of the subjects I would write about. I didn’t expect that AI would eventually become my editor. Writing each weekly post takes many hours. Before I write a single sentence, I spend considerable time thinking…
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Open AI models present an intriguing economic puzzle. They can often deliver performance approaching that of leading proprietary models at a fraction of the cost. Yet enterprises continue to overwhelmingly favor closed, proprietary models — and by some measures, their share of enterprise AI spending is actually increasing. Why is that the case? The answer…
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“Much of the effort and attention around AI for the last several years has been around technical developments,” wrote Babson College professor Tom Davenport in a recent Substack post, “The AI World Moves Toward Organizational Deployment.” “New model announced! New benchmark surpassed! New contract for massive data centers! New world-class technologists hired! You know the…
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A couple of weeks ago I posted “Why AI Can’t Replace Software Engineering,” a blog in which I discussed an important distinction that is often overlooked: software engineering is not synonymous with programming. I keep coming back to this topic because, in my opinion, the difference between programming and software engineering offers a particularly concrete…
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On May 5, 2012, I gave the commencement address at Penn State’s College of Information Sciences and Technology. Then Dean David Hall offered me excellent advice on what makes for a good commencement speech: make it personal, tell us about yourself and your background, share a few lessons you’ve learned over the years, and keep…
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AI’s potential threat to programming has been widely debated over the past few years, as evidenced by the growing number of provocative headlines. For example, “The End of Programming” argued that “the end of classical computer science is coming, and most of us are dinosaurs waiting for the meteor to hit.” Other articles have predicted…
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“Artificial intelligence is shaping how many college students think about their academic paths,” said a recently published Gallup article, “College Students Weigh AI’s Impact on Majors and Careers.” Forty-two percent of bachelor’s degree students say AI has caused them to give serious thought to changing their major, including 13% who say they have thought about…
