Artificial intelligence (AI) now powers many everyday technologies like digital assistants, facial recognition, chatbots, and smart home devices. Behind the scenes, sectors ranging from healthcare to transportation utilize AI algorithms for data analysis, process optimization, and personalized recommendations. As the capabilities of AI accelerate, we can expect to see more of its integration into common products and services.
Everyday things use AI
| Everyday Things | How AI is Used |
|---|---|
| Social Media | Curates customized feeds, provides recommendations, moderates content, serves relevant ads |
| Banking | AI chatbots provide customer support, fraud detection, process automation, personalized services |
| Digital Assistants | Natural language processing to understand and respond to voice commands |
| Facial Recognition | Smartphone unlock, building access control, social media photo tagging |
| Smart Homes | Connects and controls devices, voice commands, predictive functions, efficiency optimization |
| Autonomous Vehicles | Real-time image recognition, object detection, path planning, location mapping |
| Chatbots | Provide customer service, understand questions, direct users to solutions |
| Personalized recommendations, inventory, and logistics management | Provide customer service, understand questions, and direct users to solutions |
| Spam filtering, categorization, smart replies | |
| Maps/Navigation | Real-time traffic updates, location-based recommendations |
| Security | Threat detection, network analysis, video surveillance |
| Entertainment | Music/video recommendations, interactive media, applied gaming |
Table of Contents
Introduction
Defining Artificial intelligence and its everyday uses
Artificial intelligence (AI) refers to computer systems that can perform tasks that typically require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, and decision-making. Once confined to research labs, AI has become integral to many common products and services we use every day.
Widespread adoption of AI
The last decade has seen massive advances in AI capabilities driven by the availability of big data, increased computing power through cloud computing, and improvements in machine learning algorithms. As a result, AI adoption has accelerated sharply. We now routinely interact with AI-powered systems without even realizing it.
Common Everyday Uses of Artificial intelligence (AI)
Social media
Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok use AI to curate customized feeds, provide recommendations, moderate inappropriate content, and serve relevant ads to users. AI helps make sense of the massive volumes of data generated by social media activity.
Banking
Banks use AI chatbots and robo-advisors to provide customer support at all hours. AI aids fraud detection by analyzing transactions and spotting suspicious patterns. Behind the scenes, AI automates processes, improves risk assessment, and enables personalized banking through data analytics.
Digital assistants
Virtual assistants like Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant rely on natural language processing to understand speech, interpret requests, and respond through conversational AI interfaces. More advanced Artificial intelligence capabilities allow digital assistants to become increasingly useful everyday aids.
Facial recognition
Facial recognition systems powered by Artificial intelligence are becoming commonplace. They enable features like smartphone unlock, access control in buildings, and tagging people in social media photos. Law enforcement agencies also employ facial recognition for surveillance and investigation purposes.
Smart home devices
In smart homes, AI helps connect disparate devices like security cameras, thermostats, lights, and appliances into integrated systems. It allows for natural user interfaces via voice commands, predictive functions like anticipating user needs, and efficiency optimization in energy consumption.
Autonomous vehicles
Artificial intelligence makes autonomous driving possible through functions like real-time image recognition, object detection, sensor fusion, path planning, and location mapping. It enables vehicles to navigate roads safely with little or no human input. AI driving assistants in cars also aid human drivers through warnings and automatic emergency braking.
Chatbots
AI chatbots are taking over customer service through messaging apps, websites and phone calls. Using natural language processing and machine learning, chatbots can understand questions and handle an increasing number of support queries, directing users to solutions or human agents when required.
E-commerce
E-commerce platforms utilize Artificial intelligence to provide personalized recommendations that keep shoppers engaged. AI also aids inventory and logistics management behind the scenes. For online retailers like Amazon, the use of AI cuts costs and enables meeting customer expectations.
Artificial intelligence helps manage the huge volumes of emails that consumers and businesses handle daily. Spam filtering based on machine learning saves users countless hours. Smart email services can also categorize messages, suggest responses, identify priorities and even write short replies automatically.
Transportation
AI powers navigation apps like Google Maps and Waze which can plot optimal routes in real-time based on current traffic conditions. It also schedules public transport timetables and routes for maximum efficiency. Artificial intelligence is even being applied to improve road safety and optimize traffic light patterns to reduce congestion.
Music
Music streaming services like Spotify and Pandora rely heavily on AI to study users’ listening patterns and curate personalized playlists and music recommendations tailored to individual tastes. AI also generates observational data to help record labels and artists identify trends and better market their music.
Security
AI algorithms serve a key role in cybersecurity solutions for threat detection by identifying suspicious patterns in network traffic, system logs and user behavior. By leveraging machine learning, AI systems can get better at catching security incidents over time. AI is also being used for surveillance through facial recognition and anomaly detection in video feeds.
Maps
Technology leaders like Google Maps leverage AI to filter useful signals from billions of data points. This allows them to regularly update maps to keep pace with our changing world. AI also powers real-time traffic estimation and location-based recommendations such as restaurants and other businesses.
Spam filters
Email services like Gmail rely on AI-powered spam filters to automatically detect junk and phishing emails and block them from users’ inboxes. By analyzing data patterns from billions of messages, the filters continually learn and improve at identifying unwanted emails.
Other Everyday AI Applications
Video games
In video games, Artificial intelligence powers computer-controlled opponents and teammates with realistic behaviors. It enables features like procedurally-generated terrain and levels as well as interactive stories tailored to player choices. Applied gaming leverages AI to serve purposes like education, training and therapy.
Healthcare
AI is assisting doctors by analyzing medical images to detect tumors and other abnormalities earlier and with greater accuracy. AI chatbots provide initial patient interaction while algorithms help diagnose conditions, recommend treatments, and monitor outcomes. AI is also showing promise for drug discovery applications by unearthing data insights.
Navigation and travel
Beyond maps and transportation, Artificial intelligence offers personalized recommendations for hotels, restaurants and local attractions. It also provides suggested itineraries optimized for individual budgets, tastes and time constraints when planning vacations and business trips.
Predictive searches
Search engines like Google use AI to get better at anticipating user intentions and needs through features like autocomplete search suggestions. By predicting what a user may be searching for as they start to type, search becomes faster and more efficient.
Amazon recommendations
Amazon harnesses AI across its platforms to deliver an individually relevant customer experience. Besides recommendations on what products to purchase, AI optimizations help Amazon make timely delivery promises and optimize fulfillment routes to minimize costs.
Search
Ranking algorithms at companies like Google are powered by Artificial intelligence to better match pages and sites to query keywords. This improves the relevance and usefulness of search results. AI also connects searchers with structured data like opening hours, contact information and product availability.
Shopping
Online shopping aggregators filter product listings using AI to show customers the most relevant items and deals. Fashion retailers leverage computer vision to suggest items that match shoppers’ tastes. Overall, AI transforms shopping from a transaction-based experience to a personalized and conversational one.
Conclusion
Recap
From social media feeds to navigation systems, AI has made its way into products and services that millions use daily. Intelligent algorithms drive efficiencies for retailers and service providers while also making technology interactions more natural and customized for individual users.
The future of Artificial intelligence
As research continues, experts expect even wider adoption of AI across industries. More human-like conversational Artificial intelligence could realistically mimic exchanges between people. And devices integrated with ambient intelligence may soon be able to anticipate user needs in near seamless ways.
