IBM’s Watson represented a lot of things, including a missed opportunity for Jeopardy

Thanks again for all the great feedback everyone! New content is coming soon, but in the meantime here's an old post I wrote for my work blog that I thought was really interesting and am putting up to get your thoughts on:

I sat back one night and turned on my DVR to watch Jeopardy for the first time in recent memory.  

I was tuning in to see IBM’s Watson, an artificial intelligence computer system capable of answering questions posed in natural language, square off against two of the quiz show’s top champs. It was a battle reminiscent of Garry Kasparov vs. Deep Blue. 

The show was fun to watch, and while Watson had a hiccup or two, (watch two examples of Watson struggling here and here if you haven’t seen them yet) he very quickly put humankind in its place by racking up nearly $80,000. This was more than double the total of his two competitors combined.  

Throughout the three episodes Watson appeared on Jeopardy, one thought continued to strike me. What an incredible media and communications opportunity this was for Jeopardy, and boy did someone drop the ball! While the show did see a slight uptick in viewers (about a 2.1 percent increase from its average ratings) it was nothing compared to what could have been. 

Watson tapped into a very simple human emotion: fear. The fright of computers taking over and doing things better than us is very old, and Jeopardy could have taken advantage of this to push itself back to the forefront of pop culture. It would have also been a great opportunity to reach a new audience, similar to the way Ken Jennings, one of Watson’s competitors, did for the show years ago during his legendary run (which ironically inspired IBM to develop Watson).  

Jeopardy seemed to choose not to promote the challenge between a computer and two humans. Instead, the show relied on IBM’s commercials to get the word out. It also decided to air the three days of programs starting on Valentine’s Day, which is never a great day for TV. 

The end result: great TV with no buzz. Jeopardy loyalists who saw the shows will keep watching like always, and they are probably hoping that Watson doesn’t come back to crush anymore humans. For the rest of us, the competition may as well never have happened.