# language understanding (blogs) — RSS Amplifier Recent posts from the 1 feeds in the RSS Amplifier directory that cover language understanding. Page: Feed: --- ## [Software Is Dead. Really?](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/08/09/software-is-dead-really/) _2026-08-09 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ What happens when anyone can build software, and where the value goes once building is free. I happened to listen to a February 2026 interview with Mark Cuban on the Technology Brothers podcast and he stated very boldly: “Software is dead because everything’s going to be customized to your unique utilization.” This is the kind \[…\] ## [Hitchcock, Shannon, and AI](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/07/30/hitchcock-shannon-and-ai/) _2026-07-30 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Why we expand information to compress it later. Many years ago I read a book called Hitchcock on Hitchcock, and one small passage in it has stayed with me longer than almost anything else I have read about films, which is one of my passions. Surprisingly, I have come to think that the ideas expressed \[…\] ## [Is the History of AI a Technical Subject?](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/07/21/is-the-history-of-ai-a-technical-subject/) _2026-07-21 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ On teaching the history of the field not as a chronology of methods but as a record of the bets we made, and lost. In January of 2023 I was in Doha, at the IEEE Spoken Language Technology Workshop, sitting on a panel with several other people who had been in the field long enough \[…\] ## [Prompting Is Not AI Research](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/07/14/prompting-is-not-ai-research/) _2026-07-14 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Is working on machines built by others AI research? It can be. Usually it is not… A few weeks ago I was at one of the many AI gatherings that seem to happen in New York on any given evening now. The discussion was lively and well informed: the current state of the models, the \[…\] ## [AI Democratization and Its Discontents](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/06/29/ai-democratization-and-its-discontents/) _2026-06-29 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ On the feedback loop that AI’s democratization left behind What happens to a technology once it stops being the property of the few who understand it deeply and becomes available to the many who simply want to use it. We have come to call this democratization, and it is, on balance, a wonderful thing. But \[…\] ## [Research Is Not Engineering at a Slower Speed](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/06/10/research-is-not-engineering-at-a-slower-speed/) _2026-06-10 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Three kinds of work, three success criteria, and why confusing them is costly. Early in my career I worked at Bell Labs, where one could work on any intellectually challenging problem, whether or not it had immediate relevance to the mothership AT&T. Later I worked at startups where the pressure to sell and ship was \[…\] ## [From Spark to System (Part III)](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/04/27/from-spark-to-system-part-iii/) _2026-04-27 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Where Does the Bridge Get Built? This is the third essay in the From Spark to System series. Part I: “Why the Real AI Revolution Hasn’t Happened Yet.” Part II: “The Bridge That Was Never Built.” The previous two posts in this series built a framework. The first argued that the AI revolution most people \[…\] ## [From Spark to System (Part II)](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/04/10/from-spark-to-system-part-ii/) _2026-04-10 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ The Bridge That Was Never Built. This is the second of three posts on innovation: what it actually is, how it differs from invention, and how technologies evolve through the construction of domains, translation into products, and the specific kind of leadership each phase requires. In my previous post I argued that the AI revolution \[…\] ## [From Spark to System (Part I)](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/03/27/from-spark-to-system/) _2026-03-27 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Why the Real AI Revolution Hasn’t Happened Yet. This is the first of three posts on innovation: what it actually is, how it differs from invention, and how technologies evolve through the construction of domains, translation into products, and the specific kind of leadership each phase requires. The thing everyone is calling the AI revolution, \[…\] ## [profullstack on Ko‑fi (Sponsored)](https://crawlproof.com/a/ByQFr2xHoNqi) _2026-03-27 · **Sponsored**_ Open the creator's Ko‑fi page. ## [Transactional and Relational Intelligence](https://voiceinthemachine.com/2026/01/19/transactional-and-relational-intelligence/) _2026-01-19 · Roberto Pieraccini · THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE_ Over the years, I’ve come to see that useful AI needs more than accurate execution. It needs the ability to engage with humans over time, cope with uncertainty, and build shared understanding. This post reflects on why balancing transactional reliability with relational intelligence matters.