You may recall an earlier post on Watson (refresh your memory), IBM’s artificial intelligence system that is part of their DeepQA, a research project that aims to understand and answer questions that are asked in everyday natural language.
During a warm-up match shot in early January 2011, Watson competed against two of the all-time greats of the popular American quiz show, “Jeopardy!” Watson was pitted against Ken Jennings, who has won over USD 3,000,000 and Brad Rutter, the biggest all-time money earner on the show. At the end of the round, Watson came out the clear winner. Now the time for the IBM Challenge has come, and during the period from February 14th to the 16th Watson will officially face the two champions in two matches. The winner of the matches will pocket the USD 1,000,000 prize. Here is day one of the IBM Challenge where the show introduces Watson and takes a look at its innards and history before proceeding to the contest.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PSPvHcLnN0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtHlxzOXgYs
So, were you surprised at the results?
[via Aki Anastasiou on Twitter]