Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A: Stephen Wolfram Livestreams

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (August 14, 2024) »

1 hour 24 minutes

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Can you tell us more about your book collection (or your artifact or art collection)? How does a "dashboard/portal" webpage as you show sometimes, with lists and links to your projects, and such tools, fit in your workflow and daily routines? Stephen, are you also the CTO of Wolfram Research? What are the characteristics of a good CTO? Do you find video calls draining? What is the Wolfram software continuity plan in the event something happens to you? You are so instrumental in the development of this software, so your absence would be a hard gap to fill. Did you have a mentor while creating your business? Do you find mentors useful? Faces distract from logic because we spend too long assessing people's emotions. Just wanted to share my personal Mathematica "story." I learned to know Mathematica way back when it was running on DOS in text mode and switched into graphics mode when I wanted to plot something. Later I switched to an early Windows version. Back then Macs were too expensive for me, but I loved that Mathematica was a free integral part of Macs! Could you share your methods for generating and keeping track of ideas? Do you have favorite techniques for being productive? View Less »

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (July 31, 2024) »

1 hour 16 minutes

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What can you tell us about the next Wolfram Language release? What are you most excited to see added to the language? Do you worry about the increasing appearance of incompetence in the world? The version numbers do get fuzzy over time.... Are you thinking about using years instead? It would be clearer how old your version is.... Any advice for autodidacts? How does one turn a personal curiosity or question about science into a structured project that can be published, as you often do? Do you think AI will take away some human autonomy, ultimately making humans less intelligent overall as they rely on AI too much? How do you think the patent system could be improved by AI? I wonder if we will go through a cycle of trusting AI far too much for answers to our questions, and then when we get too much incorrect information we give up and move to a position of total distrust. Where do you think we will end up? What has been your favorite place/country to visit? Is there someplace you have yet to visit that you would like to? What is it like starting one's first business? I'm just wondering because I don't personally know anyone who has a business. On that topic, if you had to start an innovation-intensive business nowadays, requiring R&D before revenues, would you go the VC route or find ways to bootstrap it (and if so, how)? Can AI systems be effectively applied to customer support roles, or is there too large of a security vulnerability? Can you elaborate on your experience expanding your business and products to be used by others whose language(s) you don't speak? What's your favorite new revelation or idea you read in your recent deep dive into philosophy? How often do you revisit your own personal goals in life and in your career? What are some things you look at that make you feel accomplished, whether small or big? View Less »

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (July 17, 2024) »

1 hour 22 minutes

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I loved the discussion with a robot! Based on that talk, how do you imagine a future of robots in business? (Robot coworkers, bosses, assistants, etc.) Will robots be able to effectively communicate with their human companions and vice versa? What business ideas can you think of for useful AI applications? How can we make building your own AI for your own purposes easy and affordable (such as having a bot that helps you find weekly coupons and savings for grocery trips, or for mapping ideal travel times)? What do you think of "robots" remotely operated by humans as a precursor to autonomous robots? A new spin on outsourced blue-collar labor? I believe that another crucial thing is that not only should technologies adapt to people's demands, but humans should quickly adapt to technology's demands in the field. Just recall how weird the computer mouse was for us 30–40 years ago. It is very useful for us humans to understand what the AI knows when it outputs its LLM computations. Maybe some layered hybrid architecture could work with LLMs providing the base, so to speak, while the other modules do more to correct what is there, perhaps? What's the gold in AI, LLMs, etc.? Is there some simpler algorithm that can learn, instead of big neural networks? Like trying to find gold in a goldmine? What do you make of the apparent disconnect between the heavy capital expenditure into AI infrastructure vs. the lagging revenues from applications at the present time? Are we in for a "2000 telecom/fiber"-like setback? For full robot integration into human society, will we see robot "coffee shops" where robots will be able to go and refuel/charge? What business opportunities would working robots open up? How was your annual summer of professoring? Kudos to all the student projects! Will you let future robots enroll in the Summer School? View Less »

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (June 5, 2024) »

1 hour 20 minutes

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What business opportunities could you see being successful in the next ten years? What do you think about the sort of "density of information" in science or philosophy? Like your TED talk could be a pamphlet, a book or a multi-volume set of books—same deal with philosophy? Would you ever teach a how-to writing course? What's your opinion about the space tourism business? Do you think there's a missing feature of current tech that computer or phone developers are overlooking? How can they capitalize on AI? Somebody from NASA or SpaceX should put a 360-degree camera on Mars such that people on Earth can look around. How important do you think interdisciplinary knowledge is for driving innovation? I'm entering college this fall. What advice do you have for a college student's first year? Can you think of ways to make a career out of learning? How can I stay focused and work on projects that I'm not necessarily excited about with general ed, especially where my major is not focused? I have several ideas for real-world applications of my work and I am a scholar in my heart, and it seems that a math PhD (currently doing MSc) and then continuing to be around academia is the best way to do that. Could you say your thoughts about this? Should I leave academia and work on these, or mix, or only after PhD? [My advice for education is] take classes that teach you how to learn or solve problems or different ways to think about subjects. Those were the most valuable classes. Could there be an argument for different types of schooling vs. common curriculums to better fit different learning styles? How do you compare scholarly life vs. entrepreneurial life? Can being a CEO be taught or is it something a person innately has the ability for? What would you study? View Less »

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (May 15, 2024) »

1 hour 2 minutes

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Can you patent an algorithm? Machine learning models? Will we need a new division of law for AI cases? What is the precedent? Can blockchain mitigate the AI "facts," or is it its own threat to communications and liberty? Can you rationalize a world where "free-to-use" AI services utilize licenses that allow free use, but then the operating company can capitalize on the content that they generate? What is a good process for knowledge transfer from employee to employee? If you had the chance to redo your life, would you choose differently in terms of what choices you made academically? Have you written any books or do you have any thoughts on childhood education? Now that I have three kids at different stages, I find it challenging that the school curriculums are trying to make conforming students while lacking effort in individual talent discovery. What's your experience and how have you approached it? Do you still check your emails regularly? I find it a distraction for productivity and originality due to the bombardment of emails, text and all of it. I see this as a potential area for AI to personalize, and it could be simple to make. What do you think? Wolfram's writings are actually often a quite good read and have a unique humor. MUCH better than most papers that came out in the last 20 years. I want to do something that should be an internet-based business, and thermodynamics and its applications should be a central part of the business. Do you have any tips? View Less »

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A:

Business, Innovation and Managing Life (April 24, 2024) »

1 hour 29 minutes

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How do businesses adapt to changing technology? Are there existing strategies to combat roadblocks in development? Is Wolfram Language much faster today than it was 35 years ago? What has been the biggest or most notable technological advancement in your lifetime? How do you think about the "buy" vs. "build" dilemma—notably for one so opinionated and driven to have it one's way as yourself, as opposed to being more compromising? How do you think about and handle competition, be it business or technological competition (say LLMs vs. the Wolfram Language symbolic approach)? Do you think having middle management in high-tech companies hinders innovation? You just mentioned that someone can't build something that took 30 years to build. Do you think that will change with AI advancing enough to cut build timeframes by orders of magnitude? Speaking of that area, what innovation and business lessons can be learned from Thinking Machines and such failed ventures? Do you agree that technology is brimming with ideas and resources, many of which are free? This shift has transformed business approaches, with today's opportunities primarily centered around services. I appreciate your approach to making software easy to use. I've used Oracle, SAP and JD Edwards ERP software and so much of it is overly complicated. We were tethered to them for support. Any advice on starting a career in tech with everything moving at such a fast pace? I've read about your endeavors, from writing books at 13 to earning a PhD at 20. How did you manage such accomplishments and cultivate the imagination needed for complex topics? View Less »

Stephen Wolfram Livestreams

Business, Innovation & Managing Life Q&A (78 videos)