Earlier this year I was asked to give a Keynote on the topic of Brand Humanizing, robotization, and AI. The hosts had given it the title: “Help, the robots are coming!” and wanted me to explain if technology were to become a threat or an aid. My opening statement was: “Give me 20 minutes and I’ll transform the title into ‘the robots are coming to help’ and eliminate all fear”. So there I was, talking about the main benefits of technology taking over processes and, from a Brand Humanizing perspective, how people would become more human and interact more. One of my main arguments of the latter was that people, unlike robots, are able to connect with other humans and have genuine conversations.
My grandmother might be talking to robots
Immediately following my talk was my Q&A which I always do straight after presenting. One of the attendees touched upon what I said about robots not being able to have (genuine) conversations with humans and how she felt that wasn’t true. She gave me an example of a robot built on conversational AI through (natural language understanding) that’s roaming elderly homes. The purpose of this machine is to talk to the elderly who are feeling lonely and provide them with some company. She added: “It’s genuine and feels like a human because the robot can memorize the conversation and touch upon earlier…
