Artificial Intelligence: Technology Trends that Aren’t “Out-There” Anymore!

10 minute read at Lucidea Think Clearly blog

• https://blog.lucidea.com/artificial-intelligence-technology-trends-that-arent-out-there-anymore

In a recent post, I listed nine newer technologies not just on the horizon but quickly having an impact on both the consumer space and coming fast into our spaces—libraries, archives, museums, and galleries (the so-called GLAM sector).

For the next nine posts I’ll highlight some of the trends in each and explore the impact they may have on our profession and sector(s).

Don’t bury the lede! My personal insight is that we’re reaching a new era of convergence. We’re progressing past the convergence of devices (think how your smartphone encompasses device convergence—music player, camera, books, video players and recorders, web browsing, payments, and, oh yeah, a telephone and more!) into a world where these 9 technology interventions combine data, software, and experience to create a fundamentally new world of information experiences based on behaviour.

Consider the weight of the 1965 iPhone:

(photo credit)

Let’s explore each trend in turn and think about what’s on the horizon coming at our field, culminating in Web 4.0.

Artificial Intelligence

ar·ti·fi·cial in·tel·li·gence 
noun
the theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.” (OED)

Artificial Intelligence, combines expert systems, Natural Language Processing, pattern recognition and robotics. This combination is reaching towards simulating many human capabilities such as reading, writing, grasping, calculating, speaking, remembering, comparing numbers, drawing, making judgments, and even interactive learning. Researchers are working on the systems that have the ability to reason, to learn or accumulate knowledge to strive for self-improvement, and to simulate human sensory and mechanical capabilities. Experts are convinced that it is now only a matter of time; the present generation will experience the impact and utility of new applications based on artificial intelligence in offices, factories, libraries and homes. This general area of research is known as ‘Artificial Intelligence’.

Artificial Intelligence mainly focuses on understanding and performing intelligent tasks such as reasoning, learning new skills and adapting to new situations and problems. Artificial Intelligence, or AI for short, is a combination of computer science, psychology, and philosophy. It is concerned with the concept and methods of symbolic inferences by computer and the symbolic representation of knowledge to be used.

“Artificial Intelligence focuses on symbolic, non-algorithmic problem-solving methods. Intelligence relies on the ability to manipulate symbols. The goal of its sub areas i.e. expert system, Natural Language Processing, pattern recognition, and robotics is to simulate human intelligence with computers.” (Footnote i)

Note that non-algorithmic methods include access to big and small data on behaviours—searching, browsing, profile, etc. Libraries can access and exploit these data.

Librarians are experts! “In artificial intelligence, an expert system is a computer system that emulates the decision-making ability of a human expert. Expert systems are designed to solve complex problems by reasoning through bodies of knowledge, represented mainly as if–then rules rather than through conventional procedural code.“

Natural Language Processing is one of the long-standing goals of computer science—to teach computers to understand the language we speak. “Natural Language Processing (NLP) is a branch of artificial intelligence that helps computers understand, interpret and manipulate human language. NLP draws from many disciplines, including computer science and computational linguistics, in its pursuit to fill the gap between human communication and computer understanding.”

“Pattern Recognition is the process of establishing a close match between some new stimulus and previously stored stimulus patterns. This process is being performed continually through the lives of all living things. Pattern recognition is studied in many fields, including psychology, ethnology, cognitive science and computer science. Pattern recognition is based on either a priori knowledge or on statistical information extracted from the patterns. The patterns to be classified are usually groups of measurements or observations, defining points in an appropriate multi dimensional space.” (Wiki, 2014) The components of pattern recognition are; data acquisition, pre-processing, feature extraction, model selection and training, and evaluation.”

Artificial Intelligence and its applications in Libraries

“Computers provide the perfect medium for the experimentation and application of Artificial Intelligence technology in the present era. AI has more success at intellectual tasks such as computer-based game playing and theorem proving than perceptual tasks. Sometimes these computer programs are intended to simulate human behaviour and they are built for technological applications also such as Computer Aided Instruction (CAI). In many cases the main goal is to find any technique that does the task quick in the better way.” (footnote i)

Library work is usually related to the reading materials, database development and access, collection development and research and reference for users and staff. The application of Expert Systems will help the librarian in realizing the need for an improvement in the productivity. A well programmed Expert System will also improve quality.

Applications of Expert Systems in Reference Service:

“Reference service is a prime activity of any library and the Expert System will work as a substitute for a reference librarian. Following are some of the examples of Expert Systems used for Reference Service.

(a) REFSEARCH: It is a system that supplies patrons, the recommended sources to lookup certain questions. The system can be used to teach students reference skills or as a computerized aid for practicing reference librarians and information specialists.

(b) POINTER: It was the early successful working application of computer system in the area of reference work. It directs the users to the reference sources; It is not a Knowledge Based System but a computer assisted reference program.

(c) Online Reference Assistance (ORA): This system was intended to stimulate the services of an academic reference Librarian for questions of low and medium level, by using several technologies: a videotext like database, computer assisted instruction modules, and a knowledge-based system. ORA consists of Directional transactions like library locations, services and polices.

(d) ANSWERMAN: A knowledge-based system to help users for reference questions on agriculture topics. It uses series of menus to narrow down the subject of the questions and the type of tool needed. It can function as either a consultation system or as a front end to external databases and CD-ROM reference tools.

(e) PLEXUS: This is a referral tool used in Public Libraries. It includes knowledge about the reference process, information retrieval about certain subject areas, reference sources, and library users. All the above systems are advisory systems for locating reference source books and factual data. (footnote i)

(f) META: Check out Meta a medical research start-up which is now part of the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative. It is a predictive search engine that tells where the research is heading.

Application of Expert Systems in Cataloguing:

Cataloguing is one of the oldest library crafts. Recent attempts to automate cataloguing through Expert Systems have focused on descriptive cataloguing because it is considered rule-based (AACR2). Recent developments in lined data as well as Bibframe provide enormous opportunities in the creation—automatically and on demand—of services and content quickly and at high quality.

“a) A human-machine interface, where the intellectual effort is divided between the intermediary and the support system; and…

b) An Expert System with full cataloguing capability linked into an electronic publishing system, so that as a text is generated on-line, it can be passed through knowledge-based systems and cataloguing process is done without any intellectual input from an intermediary.“ (footnote i)

Application of Expert Systems in Classification:

“Classification is the fundamental activity in the organization of knowledge. For this reason, it is prominent in all systems for organizing knowledge in libraries and information centers. Application of Expert System in the area of classifications in libraries includes the following:

• (a) Coal SORT: It is a conceptual browser designed to serve either as a search or an indexing tool. Coal SORT consists primarily of a frame-based semantic network and the software needed to allow users to display portions of it and to move around in the conceptual structure. The expert knowledge in the system is embodied almost entirely in the semantic network. There is no procedural knowledge in the system.
• (b) EP-X: The Environmental Pollution Expert (EP-X) has certain things in common with coal SORT in that both are concentrating on enhancing interface using a Knowledge Based approach. The knowledge base of EP-X consists of a hierarchical frame-based semantic network of concepts and a set of templates that express the patterns called the pragmatic relationship among concepts. These patterns are referred to as conceptual information.
• (c) BIOSIS: A knowledgebase, that includes a significant amount of procedural knowledge, to assign documents to categories automatically. It is designed as an indexer aid. BIOSIS uses the information in the titles of biological documents to assign as many categories as possible of those that would be assigned by human indexers. The indexing languages are structured and practical representation of information that can be used to very good advantage of AI applications.“ (footnote i)

Application of Expert Systems in Indexing:

“Indexing of periodicals and other content is another area where expert systems are being developed. Indexing a periodical article involves identification of concepts, to translate these concepts into verbal descriptions, and selecting and assigning controlled vocabulary terms that are conceptually equivalent to verbal descriptions. The reason for automating the intellectual aspects of indexing is to improve the indexing consistency and quality. Based on the information provided by the indexer, the systems can arrive at appropriate preferred terms automatically to assign relevant subdivisions. The system can make inferences and based on the inference, it can take appropriate action.’ Med Index’ is the best example of an indexing system used in the library indexing activity.“ (footnote i)

Application of Expert Systems in Acquisition:

The collection of documents is another integral part of the library. The librarian or the information officer is the key person in this activity. The users of the library have a significant role to play in building electronic collections andtheir help and advice should be solicited in the process. Several systems have been incorporated. Monograph Selection Advisor, a pioneering effort in applying this emerging technology in another area of Library Science i.e. building library collection. Specifically, the task modeled is the item-by-item decision that a subject bibliographer makes in selecting monographic. The knowledge base has to be broad enough and the interfacing aspect must be easy enough for the library to get the desired information from the machine.

Applications of Natural Language Processing (NLP) in Library Activities:

“When we think of the term NLP, the first thought is being able to speak or write in a complete sentence and have a machine process the request and speak. NLP can be applied to many disciplines.To apply this to the field of Library and Information science and more specifically to searching databases such as online public access catalogs (OPAC).“(footnote i)

NLP is becoming more and more available – especially when we play with the emerging voice response systems represented by Alexa, Siri, and Cortana.

Application of Pattern Recognition in Library Activities:

“In this era of the Internet and distributed, multimedia computing, new and emerging classes of information systems applications have swept into the lives of office workers and everyday people. New applications ranging from digital libraries, multimedia systems, geographic information systems, and collaborative computing to electronic commerce have created tremendous opportunities for information researchers and practitioners. “

Exploring the emergent field of a semantic analysis in the form of semantic networks, decisions, rules, or predicate logic. Spreading activation-based inferencing methods are often used to traverse various large-scale knowledge structures (aaai.org/AITOPICS,2014).

“One of the major trends in almost all emerging information systems applications is the focus on the user-friendly, graphical, and seamless Human-Computer Interactions. The Web-based browsers for texts, images, and videos have raised user expectations on the rendering and manipulation of information. Recent advances in the development of languages and platforms such as Java, OpenGL, and VRML and the availability of advanced graphical workstations at affordable prices have also made information visualization a promising area for research.”

Indeed, it is here we will see the convergence of text, video, GPS, graphics, data and more as we break down the siloes of the past where format of content drove database content standards.

Advantages of Artificial Intelligence

• a) Can take on stressful and complex work that humans may struggle /cannot do;
• b) Can complete tasks faster than a human can most likely;
• c) To discover unexplored things. i.e. outer space;
• d) Fewer errors and defects;
• e) Function is infinite.

Disadvantages of Artificial Intelligence

• a) Lacks the “human touch”
• b) Has the ability to replace human jobs
• c) Can malfunction and do the opposite of what they are programmed to do
• d) Can be misused leading to mass scale destruction
• e) May corrupt younger generation (footnote i)

Conclusion

For sure there will be bumps in the road. From intellectual freedom, copyright, access, walled gardens, patents, to information literacy and more, libraries provide guides that have helped guide intellectual growth for centuries. In the age of AI, those principles are more relevant than ever. “As machine learning proliferates, what steps can we take to ensure that the values of librarianship are incorporated into AI systems? Advocacy should be directed not at maintaining traditional librarianship, but in influencing the development of the emerging information systems that may come to replace us.”

The practicability of artificial intelligence in the areas such as cataloguing, classification, documentation, collection development etc. appears to be improving very fast and billions of dollars in equity capital are pursuing this mother lode. The introduction of AI techniques into Library and Information Science will be another juggernaut our field will need to contend with.

Suggested readings:

• Footnote i: (PDF) Artificial Intelligence and its applications in Libraries. [accessed Oct 31 2018].
• Artificial Intelligence & Libraries: Prepare Yourself » Dysart & Jones…
• Artificial intelligence and the library of the future, revisited » Stanford…
• An AI Lab in a Library » American Libraries Magazine
• Artificial intelligence arrives in the library » Information and Learning…
• IBM Artificial Intelligence » Watson APIs and Solutions
• Gartner AI Research Guide » Don’t get left behind

-Stephen

Stephen Abram is a popular Lucidea Webinars presenter and consultant. He is the past president of SLA, and the Canadian and Ontario Library Associations. He is the CEO of Lighthouse Consulting and the executive director of the Federation of Ontario Public Libraries. He also blogs personally at Stephen’s Lighthouse. Check out his new book from Lucidea Press, Succeeding in the world of Special Librarianship!

Topics: Artificial Intelligence, Technology

BookNet Canada Releases Bestselling Books of 2018 Lists (Fiction, Non-Fiction, Juvenile & YA)

Filed by Gary Price on December 11, 2018

From BookNet Canada:

We identified the top-selling titles in the Fiction, Non-Fiction, and Juvenile/YA categories based on print sales volume in Canada over a 48-week period from Jan. 1, 2018 to Dec. 2, 2018 (according to BNC SalesData, which tracks print sales in the English-language trade market).

10 Bestselling Fiction Books of 2018

1. The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn (9780062799555)

2. Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell (9781501192838)

3. The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris (9780062877000)

4. Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan (9780385679077)

5. The Alice Network by Kate Quinn (9780062654199)

Direct to Complete List

The 10 Bestselling Non-Fiction Books of 2018

1. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson (9780062641540)

2. 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson  (9780345816023)

3. Educated by Tara Westover (9781443452489)

4. Becoming by Michelle Obama (9781524763138)

5. Yum & Yummer by Greta Podleski  (9781775047001)

Direct to Complete List

Bestselling Titles in Canada in 2018 – Juvenile & YA

The 10 bestselling Juvenile and YA books of 2018

1. Dog Man and Cat Kid by Dav Pilkey (9780545935180)

2. The Wonky Donkey by Craig Smith (9780545261241)

3. Lord of the Fleas by Dav Pilkey (9780545935173)

4. The Meltdown (Diary of a Wimpy Kid Book 13) by Jeff Kinney (9781419727436)

5. Love You Forever by Robert Munsch  (9780920668375)

Direct to Complete List

Direct to Complete Blog Post/Analysis

The Buzz…About Books

What Toronto Read in 2018

December 11, 2018 | Wendy

Toronto Public Library’s Top 10 most-borrowed books of 2018:

1. Official MTO Driver’s Handbook: borrowed 4,665 times so far in 2018*
2. Origin by Dan Brown: 4,120
3. Bellevue Square by Michael Redhill: 4,033
4. The Rooster Bar by John Grisham: 3,640
5. Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff: 3,547
6. Into the Water by Paula Hawkins: 3,289
7. Parting Shot by Linwood Barclay: 3,189
8. The Late Show by Michael Connelly: 3,169
9. Glass Houses by Louise Penny: 3,058
10. Camino Island by John Grisham: 3,055

It’s the end of another year and, looking back to see what Torontonians read in 2018*, we’ve drawn a few unscientific conclusions about the reading habits of our citizens: 

_{*Numbers reflect print books borrowed as of December 10, 2018. Final circulation numbers for the year will be higher.}

1. People learn life skills at the library

It’s an open secret that the Ontario Ministry of Transport’s Driver’s Handbook is the most-borrowed book pretty much every year. We think it shows that we’re useful to young people, newcomers and all kinds of folks who are looking to develop their life skills. Pro tip – if you’re getting ready for your driving test, we have multiple copies of the Handbook in every branch!

2. Local Giller-winners make good

Toronto readers borrowed nearly as many copies of Bellevue Square, a literary thriller by Toronto-based author Michael Redhill, as they did of Origin, the latest blockbuster by international uber-bestselling author Dan Brown. We’re sure Bellevue Square winning the 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize didn’t hurt because we saw the same thing last year, when Madeleine Thien’s Giller- and Governor General’s Award-winning family saga, Do Not Say We Have Nothing, swept the city.

3. Toronto readers care about what’s happening in the world

Did you know that, when it came out in January, more people placed library holds on Michael Wolff’s White House exposé, Fire and Fury, in Toronto than they did in New York, Washington, or any other city we looked at? Do you know how exciting that was for us library workers? It shows us two great things about the readers in this city: 1. You care about what’s going on in the world. 2. When you want to get your hands on a book, you turn to the library. We couldn’t be happier.

4. Toronto readers know what they like…

…and what they (we) like is suspense. The last five authors on our most-borrowed books list – Grisham, Penny, Connelly, Barclay, Hawkins – all write mysteries and/or thrillers. Additionally, they were all on our top ten list last year, for their previous novels. 

And that’s not all…

The insights don’t end there! To give you a more complete picture, we’ve compiled the top five books in each of four categories: Adult Fiction, Adult Nonfiction, Teen Fiction and Children’s Picture Books: 

Top 5 adult fiction titles:

This year, we enjoyed being puzzled and thrilled. (And note that two authors with deep Toronto roots made our top 5):

1. Origin by Dan Brown: borrowed 4,120 times in 2018
2. Bellevue Square by Michael Redhill: 4,033
3. The Rooster Bar by John Grisham: 3,640
4. Into the Water by Paula Hawkins: 3,289
5. Parting Shot by Linwood Barclay: 3,189

Top 5 adult nonfiction titles:

You’ve heard about the Driver’s Handbook and Fire and Fury. The nonfiction top 5 is rounded out by Jordan Peterson’s self-help book, Trevor Noah’s memoir, and Marie Kondo’s manifesto about how and why to clean up your space.

1. The Official MTO Driver’s Handbook: borrowed 4,665 times in 2018
2. Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff: 3,547
3. 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Jordan Peterson: 2,514
4. Born a Crime by Trevor Noah: 2,354
5. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo: 2,274

Top 5 Young Adult titles:

Young adult readers are doing a lot of the heavy lifting this year. Turtles All The Way Down, by the immensely popular John Green, is a heartfelt, personal narrative about a teen living with obsessive-compulsive disorder. In The Hate U Give, a young woman becomes an activist in the Black Lives Matter movement after police kill her friend. And The Marrow Thieves imagines a horrifying future in which settler Canadians bring back residential schools. 

1. Turtles All the Way Down by John Green: borrowed 1,536 times in 2018
2. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas: 1,351
3. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak: 1,038
4. The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline: 1,001
5. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green: 990

Top 5 children’s picture books:

We’re not surprised to see The Very Hungry Caterpillar, by Eric Carle, at the top of this list because it’s sold approximately one copy per minute since it was published in 1969. Beloved Canadian Robert Munsch had to be here somewhere as well. But Todd Parr‘s inclusive, feel-good picture books are relative newcomers to the scene. And we’re frankly astonished that Mo Willems’ The Pigeon Needs a Bath beat out the more traditional Don’t Let The Pigeon Drive the Bus for a place in our top 5. (What if the pigeon takes this as permission to drive the bus?!)

1. The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle: borrowed 2,204 times in 2018
2. It’s Okay to be Different by Todd Parr: 1,294
3. Love the World by Todd Parr: 1,254
4. The Pigeon Needs a Bath by Mo Willems: 1,221
5. Mud Puddle by Robert Munsch: 1,178

Are there any books on this list that surprise you? How many have you read? Tell us in the comments!Previous