Link used: http://timschambers.com/blog/?

p=130

What could be the reasons to design and develop a computer based information
system (Watson) to compete with humans in Question Answering like Jeopardy?

to advance the field of machine understanding

to increase business efficiency via better data retrieval and processing
to increase public interest and consumer opportunities in semantic technologies by
using a show as famous as Jeopardy (as there was a need to increase research in
this field)

What capabilities is IBM trying to develop through this project? Does it have any
other application

Even though proper data management techniques exist, semantically enabled data
retrieval are beginning to be sought by large businesseswhich is an opportunity that IBM
wished to exploit. Watson had better Natural Language Processing Capabilities that cross
referenced data from various sources.
Leads to progress in fields like

Data Analytics
Artificial Intelligence
The general logic Watson uses to derive a series of hypotheses from its
information repositories could apply onto the medical sciences by finding valuable
insights to improve diagnosis and treatment and reduce cost of care
To help calculate risks on investments and loans in real time in banking
Improve automated customer interactions for a better CRM system

How is the Watson approach fundamentally different than Database Management

and Google-like Search?
DeepQA , the system behind Watson, combined advances in NLP, statistical machine
learning, knowledge representation and reasoning and information retrieval.
Within a space of a few tenths of a second, Watson could simultaneously
understand and make judgments upon innumerable pieces of semi-organized data,
e.g. the entirety of Wikipedia in addition to several ontologies and other data sources.
This synergizing of resources and research harkens not just to Googles nascent
semantic search or any other database management system.

How did Ferruci motivate the team

Ferruci took a collaborative approach, teaching his team to act like a start-up within
IBM

To prevent people from being locally focussed on specific component metrics,

ferruci eliminated the need for his team members to submit research papers.

This also helped in preventing the team from tweaking existing algorithms and
creating a new thought processes
Hired people from universities who did not have institutional preconceptions
about the processes CROSS POLLINATION
Team worked closely with all working from same room

Do you think targeting Jeopardy ! was a publicity stunt? If yes, elaborate on your
thinking
Yes, targeting jeopardy was in a way a publicity stunt. But the game design
was also in line with the kind of work that was being done.