Artificial intelligence applications are being rapidly integrated into our everyday lives, enhancing our health, safety and overall well-being. The automation that AI offers may be invisible to most of us, but we enjoy the result: convenience and efficiency taken to new levels.
AI is embedded in many of our daily activities. Online searches and the fitness app you may be wearing are driven by AI. The recommendations you receive for viewing videos or streaming programs on Netflix or Spotify are based on your viewing and listening history. And Amazon uses your browsing and purchase history to offer you additional recommendations and discounts. These are also capable through AI functions.
The list goes on. Virtual assistants such as Siri and Alexa help you with reminders. Assistive technologies such as voice or facial recognition can help those with disabilities. And chatbots are increasingly being used to help consumers 24/7 to answer their questions and expedite response times.
Those are all AI applications that have been integrated by organizations to make our lives easier, but there are also AI applications that we can initiate ourselves.
Everywhere we turn, we see new AI applications. Schools are showing students how to embrace AI to make learning more productive and rewarding. Health care providers are using AI for precision, real-time diagnoses and treatment of patients, including surgery. Even high-definition video streams from security cameras require terabits of data that must be processed in microseconds, or millionths of a second.
These AI applications demand more bandwidth, or the amount of data that can be transmitted over the internet, with virtually no latency, or lags in the transmission of data.
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There is a growing realization that the effectiveness of AI applications is dependent upon a high-functioning network. Fiber optic cables that transfer data using light signals through glass strands at faster speeds surpass traditional copper cables that use electrical signals, which are subject to interference.
As AI and its subsets, machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL), become more complex, robust bandwidth is becoming critically important.
Recon Analytics, a research firm specializing in telecommunications and AI, analyzed AI engagement patterns of about 35,000 respondents over a three-month period and found a strong correlation between fiber-optic internet and intensive AI use. Recon Analytics’ explanation makes sense: Those at the forefront of AI use may have moved beyond OpenAI’s ChatGPT or Microsoft Co-Pilot and may be using applications involving high-resolution images, video streaming or advanced coding. To break through to the next level, they may have found it necessary to upgrade to a more powerful internet service provider.
Another factor driving this change is the iterative, interactive nature of AI. Collaboration in real-time by uploading prompts and downloading responses is part of the two-way conversation inherent in AI applications. Fiber networks’ capability to offer symmetrical upload and download speeds becomes a necessity to derive the most value from AI.
These trends have important implications for Hawaii. Fiber internet service could greatly improve the quality of life in your home, and allow businesses to harness the power of AI to give them a strong competitive advantage in the global marketplace and deliver more value for their customers.
Chris Raker is Hawaiian Telcom’s director of consumer sales. He can be reached at chris.raker@hawaiiantel.com.