Artificial Intelligence: Just Because We Can, Does It Mean That We Should?

As a technologist, Artificial Intelligence fascinates me. It always has, since the beginning of my forays into Computer Science. I did two startups in the nineties, at the heart of which were AI-driven innovations.

The world’s recent embrace of AI, thus, also fascinates me.

Driverless cars are all the rage these days. Uber is chomping at the bit to replace the headache of having to pay anything at all to their drivers, having driven the labor cost down already to the minimum. Drivers still cost them 75% of the fare.

Yes. An entire profession of drivers of trucks, taxis, buses and such are about to get wiped out.
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A Startup Idea for European Entrepreneurs to Create Jobs for European Engineers

Europe is going through tremendous challenges, recently exacerbated by the Brexit mess. I spend a fair bit of time in Europe on a regular basis, and every time I am there, I feel anguished by the malaise that envelops so much of the continent.

In theory, Europeans know that they have to get on the entrepreneurship bandwagon, and certain cities have successfully jumpstarted thriving eco-systems. Berlin is doing a nice job, and London was, until it opened this new can of worms.
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Future of Artificial Intelligence: Brexit, Trump and Other Calamities

On Friday, June 24, 2016, the world watched in horror as Britain voted to commit economic suicide as a nation.

On November 8, 2016, America will vote. Will it also commit economic and political suicide?

Increasing inequality is building up great stress in the world economic system. The disenfranchised masses are expressing their anger, including in irrational ways such as the Brexit vote.

The trends are worrisome.
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What is Jeff Bezos Doing with The Washington Post?

A few days back, I read an extensive analysis of the Washington Post under Jeff Bezos titled The Bezos Effect: How Amazon’s Founder Is Reinventing The Washington Post – and What Lessons It Might Hold for the Beleaguered Newspaper Business.
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Entrepreneurs: Beware of the Twilight Zone of VC-Funded Startups

The MIT Technology Review just published an article titled Why Startups Are Struggling where it looks for answers to the question:

Even amid the venture capital boom of the past few years, entrepreneurs are finding it harder to build big, enduring companies. What does this mean for the future of innovation?

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Capitalism in the Age of Free Riders

LinkedIn’s recent sale to Microsoft is yet another case in point that freemium business models are a struggle to scale. LinkedIn offers excellent value to its users. Still, few are willing to pay for that value. Thus, the company faces a slowing growth curve, resulting in the decision to sell.

The truth is, on the Internet, everyone wants everything for free. Especially consumers.

And so, almost all media / content related business models are facing a wall.
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10 Small-scale Startup Ideas

In our work with entrepreneurs, it is evident that many of you are looking for small-scale startup ideas to start developing that can grow to robust $1M+ businesses.

Some of you wish to do these as side businesses, while holding onto your jobs.

Some of you just want to build a solid lifestyle business and enjoy running it.

Some of you want to get started in a bootstrapping with a paycheck mode, and then quit your day jobs.
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Future of Work: Utopia or Dystopia?

There’s a lot of discussion in every media outlet right now about the impact of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Robotics, and over-automation. The Economist has an article titled Basically Flawed, Rethinking the Welfare State:

WORK is one of society’s most important institutions. It is the main mechanism through which spending power is allocated. It provides people with meaning, structure and identity. Yet work is a less generous, and less certain, provider of these benefits than it once was. Since 2000 economic growth across the rich world has failed to generate decent pay increases for most workers. Now there is growing fear of a more fundamental threat to the world of work: the possibility that new technologies, from machine learning to driverless cars, will cause havoc to employment.

There are two schools of thought on the subject, though.
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