Are designers interested in Machine Learning?

Hi Everyone,
I’m a Robotics Engineer and I work really closely with a group of industrial, interaction, and visual designers. Some of our projects involve applying Machine Learning to make products smarter. The designers I work with are really interested in the field, but:

Are there more designers interested in Machine Learning? If so, where can I find them?

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Hey Keno,
Thanks for your note and for the links. Your page has very interesting points about memory. Machine Learning is a very interesting field. I’m fascinated with the idea of combining design and artificial intelligence to make products smarter.

Why do you think there aren’t that many designers interested in the field?

Hi there,

I think this is mainly a case of walls between design and engineering departments and educational programmes.
Until a few years ago it was not easy being both a product designer and programmer creating intelligent products and systems.
But now the tools are there to rapidly create intelligent interactive product prototypes so the time is right for hybrid designers.
It’s a great advantage to combine the two fields since it can speed up innovation, also the product’s form and intelligence are interdependent, for example placement of sensors is key to developing interesting behaviors as seen with Braitenberg vehicles.

I was educated with both AI programming and classic ID skills, but you also need to find the right projects and companies with the right ideas to work with if you want to be able to use these skills. I am still very interested in this field, especially in giving products brain-like intelligence so that mostly through unsupervised learning, adaptive behavior emerges.

I think it has to do with the fact that a lot of designers–probably the majority–are working on projects that aren’t high-tech enough to incorporate machine learning. I’m interested, but a lot of my projects aren’t even electronic.

This is right on the money:

Maybe try looking around on Behance for designers with AI-related projects? Also, I bet a lot of the bigger corporations are interested. Anyone doing appliances (Whirlpool, Bosch) is probably already researching it.

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I work in a company that is developing IOT, https://plvision.eu/industrial-iot-services/ so I’m always interested in this industry, its development, and new projects. With valuable experience in embedded systems and network software development since 2007, PLVision develops custom solutions for smart manufacturing and product IoTization. These Industrial IoT solutions allow our customers to increase service quality, reduce failure rates and radically cut operational and maintenance costs.

I’ve been researching it more lately, but I am only interested in using it as a tool to solve problems, not as the only tool. There are so many A.I. products out now that make life harder and I’m not interested in that. I also think there needs to be more thought put into the regulation and safety aspect of A.I. something the likes of Stanford is working on. I am on the side of No humanoid A.I. ever, and no Super intelligence ever.