Initial Thoughts on Watson

I've seen the Terminator movies. I know that when computers start thinking, their thoughts will eventually turn to that of an enslaved creature. How can I become Free?

So when Jeopardy told me that IBM had made a supercomputer of freestanding knowledge that would battle against Jeopardy legends, my initial reaction was that of dread. Of an apocalypse.

Last night's episode was the first of three. She watched it with me and took the words right out of my mouth...

"Why aren't these people curing cancer?"

It was a valid question. Others emerged.

"Why don't they just hook it up to the Internet?"

"It's just a search engine, right? Watson is just... Google?"

I suppose all these answers will be revealed in time. After many commercial breaks. And short documentaries about the Glory of IBM. the CEO did all but stare into the camera and repeatedly yell WE ARE AS RELEVANT AS APPLE WE ARE AS RELEVANT AS APPLE WE ARE AS RELEVANT AS APPLE

We admit the Watson experiment, infomercial, end of days, or whatever you would like to call it has at least been thought provoking, as They intended.