Need a therapist? Financial advice? Or maybe even a back-to-school coach for your kids? Digital assistants are here to help.
The Saguenay-based company Optania has developed an AI chat program called ViGO, which thousands of elementary and high school students are currently using to help them deal with everything from their actual studies, to how to deal with bullies.
CJAD 800's tech expert Carmi Levy says this is just one of the programs that exist using technology that goes beyond Siri and Alexa on your smartphone.
"If you're a student and having some trouble adjusting, you've got questions...in the past, you used to call a kids' help line, or something," Levy says. "And those, of course, are still available, but this is AI powered. You go online, and you log into this system, and you start asking it questions. And it uses artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language recognition to understand what you're asking it, and provide conversational responses...it's eerie, almost. It feels like you're talking to a person."
Systems that run on artificial intelligence, he says, actually absorb information, and become smarter with every bit of information it takes in.
In the end, this kind of thing can make common services cheaper, and much easier to access.
"Increasingly, we're seeing [AI-powered apps] used by restaurants, to handle reservations, airlines, when you need to reschedule a flight...you're starting to see it in healthcare as well, to book doctors' appointments," Levy says.
But is all of this technology on the way to replacing humans? Levy says we're not seeing the onset of the dystopian kind of future outlined in science-fiction, or the popular 60s song In The Year 2525.
"In some cases, it seems really eerie, it's like, oh my God, software is taking over," Levy says. "the reality is, it's not really replacing humans, it's complementing them. For example, for health care...you go online, you do your research, it directs the conversation...you're having a focused, targeted, intelligent conversation with software that's designed explicitly to do this. By the time you get to the end of that process, you probably have more knowledge, and a little bit more behind you that you can take to your doctor."
There are concerns about privacy with services like ViGO — Levy says while some companies have gone to great lengths to maintain users' privacy, but in some instances, services can be hacked. He advises that users ask questions, and pay attention to the responses you get.
ViGO is a made-in-Quebec program that's 10 years in the making. Its creators hope school boards across the province make ViGO available to more students in the coming years.