A Real-World Example of AI Success

Crain's Chicago Business has just written about a real-world example of business success with AI: Northwest Meat.  This small, family-owned business provides meat to restaurants in Chicago.  They had a daily task that they dreaded: taking orders, and compiling the warehouse schedule for the next day, involving over 1,000 different products.  It involved either the owner, or office staff, spending three hours at night.

Now, they use an AI tool called Choco AI that is designed for food distributors. It's cut their time down from three hours to less than 60 minutes.  Northwest Meat told Crain's that they pay $1100/month for the tool, and the owner estimates it saves him $22k/year in labor expenses.  #AI #distribution #supplychain

© 2024 Praveen Puri

High Tech / High Touch and Medical AI

Today, I was reading some letters to the editor in the Wall Street Journal, written by physicians.

They were commenting on how the current business of healthcare pushes doctors out and into a role like a cog in the machine.

One MD said "I was told that individualized medical care was too inefficient, and I wasn't a team player."

The thing is that health care is not like getting an appliance fixed. We are talking about people's lives, and the stress, emotion, and drama that goes with it.  People need patient-centric medicine.

I think the solution can be found in the title of an old book called "High Tech / High Touch."  The secret should be to give "inefficient" personalized healthcare, and attention, while compensating by making the back office bureaucracy efficient through intelligent use of technology and AI.

Today, it's just the opposite, where medical and insurance paperwork take up so much of doctors' time, and pressure them to reduce their face time with patients.

#AI #medicaltechnology #medicine

© 2024 Praveen Puri

Juggling Glass and Rubber Balls

"We are all juggling too many balls. Differentiate between glass balls and rubber balls — and don’t be afraid to drop the rubber balls." - Praveen Puri

© 2024 Praveen Puri

Unlikely Viral You-Tube Series from Azerbaijan

In the Economist, they had an article about this farm lady in Azerbaijan who has a hit You Tube channel, just cooking on the farm.  I watched an episode, and it’s so interesting and relaxing to watch.  No talking, and great edits to all the animals (lambs, puppies, kittens, ducks, etc) playing around:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TKP0USuzR4

© 2024 Praveen Puri

How To Improve Airline Boarding

1. Anyone trying to board with an early group get moved to last.

   
   

2. Also have a cleared area to board that is free of everyone except the next group to board.

   
   

3. Charge for carry-on luggage, and make checked luggage free.

   
   

   
   

© 2024 Praveen Puri

Is AI stealing when it trains on copyrighted work?

Is AI stealing when it trains on copyrighted work? But that's how we humans learn to write. Like AI, we "train" by reading copyrighted books and stories written by others, and we pick up the language patterns and formations.

But, while learning, if we re-write someone's paragraph or (in the case of an artist) reproduce their drawing, then we know we're in "learning mode" and won't pass that off as our work.

I think that might be missing in AI: some over-rule which tells it that, if the current iteration is too close to the training sources, then consider it "learning material" and don't output it.

© 2024 Praveen Puri

Halloween Dad Joke!

© 2024 Praveen Puri