One of the birthplaces of artificial intelligence, MIT, has announced a bold plan to reshape its academic program around the technology. With $1 billion in funding, MIT will create a new college that combines AI, machine learning, and data science with other academic disciplines. It is the largest financial investment in AI by any US academic institution to date. New school: The new college of computing is being built with $350 million in funding from Stephen A.… Read more

In working with MediBloc, MGH is said to be interested in the ledger technology’s suitability for storage and exchange of patient data, supplementing its EHR. Harvard Medical School’s Lab of Medical Imaging and Computation, part of Massachusetts General Hospital, has embarked on an exploratory blockchain pilot with MediBloc, a Korean startup, cryptocurrency website Coindesk reports. WHY IT MATTERSMass General will work with MediBloc – which says its mission is to leverage blockchain networks for returning “healthcare information from medical institutions to the patients and developing an ecosystem where healthcare information is distributed safely” – to help explore new storage and exchange mechanisms that complement its existing electronic health record. The aim is to co-develop new methods for security and interoperability, with a focus on patient engagement, an MGH researcher told CoinDesk.… Read more

As a podcaster, you don’t only want to reach more and more people, you want to build an audience that will truly engage with your content. Search Engine Optimization is key to attract more traffic, nonetheless audio and video files are not retrievable by search engines. The solution is to transcribe podcasts from voice to text, which will be retrievable by Search Engines. “Text is the secret.… Read more

How do the different automatic transcription services compare in accuracy? And are any of them good enough for your audio? In the last few years, automatic speech recognition has gotten really good. Computer models now understand speech as well as humans (with the right type of audio). From Mary Meeker’s 2017 Internet Trends Report It costs $1+ per minute get something hand-transcribed, so automation makes transcription affordable for all types of applications that couldn’t otherwise justify the cost.… Read more