Facebook, Amazon, Google, IBM, Microsoft form new AI alliance

Artificial Intelligence is now a part of our daily lives. It's on our wrists in the form of Apple's SIRI and in our kitchens thanks to Amazon's Alexa. We use it, but do not always understand or trust it.

Now, a collection of tech industry giants has joined together to close the knowledge and trust gap. The vehicle for this new level of understanding and, maybe, acceptance, will be a brand new mouthful of an organization: the Partnership on Artificial Intelligence to Benefit People and Society. In conversation it will actually go by the more manageable "Partnership on AI." Member companies of the new alliance are all knee-deep in artificial intelligence and Machine Learning. They include Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, Google's DeepMind and IBM. Notably absent, for now, is Apple.

The objective, according to Thursday's announcement, is "to address opportunities and challenges with AI technologies to benefit people and society."

Partnership AI will actually conduct open-source research, investigating AI areas such as ethics and human and AI system collaboration. One thing it will not do is lobby governments on behalf of AI initiatives by member companies.

"“The possibilities for positively impacting a global society with advances in AI are numerous, ranging from connectivity, healthcare, and transportation. As researchers in industry, we take very seriously the trust people have in us to ensure advances are made with the utmost consideration for human values," said Yann LeCun, the director of Facebook AI Research, in a release.

The partnership does plan to work with other third party AI organizations, including the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), and the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2).

“We’re excited about this historic collaboration on AI and its influences on people and society. We see great value ahead with harnessing AI advances in numerous areas, including health, education, transportation, public welfare, and personal empowerment," said Eric Horvitz, technical fellow a managing director at Microsoft Research, in a release.

IBM, which has aggressively spread the reach and influence of its own AI engine, Watson, gave Mashable exclusive access to an internal memo to global employees from CEO Ginni Rometty on the formation of the alliance and IBM's participation: