Searching for New Ideas - Technology Review

A couple Google Fusion Tables (recently integrated with Google Docs) excerpts from an Alfred Spector interview

Can you give an example of some AI that has come out of this research effort?

[…]

Another example is Fusion Tables, which is now part of Google Docs [the company's online office suite]. You can create a database that is shared with others and visualize and publish that data. A lot of media organizations are using it to display information on Google Maps or Google Earth to explain situations to the public. [During the recent hurricane Irene, New York public radio station WNYC used Fusion Tables to create an interactive guide to evacuation zones in the city.]

Does Google have a particular approach to AI?

[…]

We think Fusion Tables will also help our systems learn. If there are thousands of tables that say there are 50 states in the Union, there are probably 50 states in the Union. And the Union probably has states. Don't underestimate that. It sounds trivial, but computers can induce lots of information from many examples.

Searching for New Ideas - Technology Review