What is Artificial Intelligence? And what does AI have to do with an online diary? (Memairy AI Part 1)

This article is Part 1 of a series on how Memairy uses artificial intelligence to create the best online journal app experience.

A good place to start is asking the question, what exactly is AI? Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing how we interact with machines, how we relate to each other, and how we can improve our lives. Despite the massive impact AI has had on our lives, most people are unclear what this technology is. First, let's dispel the myth of AI as machines determined to destroy humanity as depicted in many a summer blockbuster movie. You can rest assured that there is not going to be an AI apocalypse any time soon. The reality of AI is much more mundane.

I often tell my students not to be misled by the name 'artificial intelligence' - there is nothing artificial about it. AI is made by humans, intended to behave by humans, and, ultimately, to impact humans' lives and human society.

From the depths of our shared past tool use has been the defining trait of human culture. AI is a tool just like a sharpened stick, fire, the wheel, the printing press, calculators, and computers. Human intelligence can be defined as our ability to learn and adapt to new environments. Artificial Intelligence is a tool that gives computers the ability to learn and utilize information in a human-like fashion. This may sound mysterious, but we all have interacted with AI if you have ever spoken to a virtual assistant or smart speaker, searched for something on the web, or flown on a plane (which is predominately controlled by an AI autopilot).

AI does not keep me up at night. Almost no one is working on conscious machines. Deep learning algorithms, or Google search, or Facebook personalization, or Siri or self driving cars or Watson, those have the same relationship to conscious machines as a toaster does to a chess-playing computer.

Artificial Intelligence has bested humanity’s chess grandmasters and Jeopardy champions however there are many areas that are effortless for humans but remain a challenge AI, such as walking, creativity, and emotional intelligence. In addition, we can perform wide range of tasks well whereas AI is limited to thin slices of greatness. An AI chess grandmaster can’t answer a single Jeopardy question correctly and an AI Jeopardy champion doesn’t know how to play chess. For now, humanity can rest peacefully in their beds confident of their superiority over machines.

We can build a much brighter future where humans are relieved of menial work using AI capabilities.

While a single AI will not challenge us in our broad abilities for the foreseeable future, the use of AI is drastically rising. It is difficult to think of an industry or aspect of our lives that will not be transformed by AI. This includes everything from education, healthcare, transportation, and even writing in a diary. Yes, Memairy uses artificial intelligence in a myriad of ways to transform the practice of keeping a journal.

To create a superior user experience, Memairy implements AI techniques, including Natural Language Processing (NLP), speech-to-text, and computer vision.

NLP methods interpret the content of diary entries as positive or negative alerting one to improving or deteriorating emotional state. This enables the ability to search diary entries by the feelings the present in entries. In addition, entries are categorized into topics using NLP which can conveniently be searched so one can easily find all entries on a specific topic.

The best journal or diary is simply the one that people will consistently use. Memairy’s technology transforms the journaling experience by allowing users to record video. Many people find it easier and more natural to speak than type. This is especially helpful for people with dyslexia and other difficulties with writing and typing. An added benefit of video is the rich emotional content captured such as facial expressions and the rhythm and pitch of the voice. The AI technique commonly referred to as “speech-to-text” takes spoken words and converts them into readable text. The aforementioned NLP methods process the converted text to similarly identify topics in and allow searching of video recordings.

AI further enhances the journaling experience by using computer vision techniques to get the most out of photos. These techniques identify objects in images making it possible to search for photos containing a specific object. Additionally, faces are detected, and the emotion of the subjects categorized as joy, sorrow, anger, surprise, among others. Computer vision also extracts text in images making it possible to digitize photos of handwritten entries.

1. What is Artificial Intelligence? And what does AI have to do with an online diary? (Memairy AI Part 1)
2. How computers understand human emotions with sentiment analysis (Memairy AI Part 2)
3. Named Entity Recognition (coming soon)
4. Computer Vision (coming soon)