Happy Holidays!

The video above could possibly be the first holiday greeting created by artificial intelligence.

We took a computer vision and pattern recognition algorithm developed at Cornell University, and trained it to recognize our company logo using Machine Learning techniques based on Convolutional Neural Networks. (Honestly, we thought that to be better use of an algorithm than teaching it to recognize a cat.)

Then, having taught it to find our logo, we ran the algorithm backwards while showing it images of trees and snowflakes.

So what's an algorithm to do if it's being run backwards while shown pictures of trees, when all it really knows how to do is recognize a company's logo? Well, being an uncomplaining machine, it does its best to find that logo. And when it doesn't find it, it tries to put one there: it starts seeing logos where there aren't any.

From that chaos, the machine creates this trippy, mesmerizing effect. An entirely new art form waiting to be experimented with.

Thanks for stopping by. Happy Holidays to you. As we look forward to 2017, we marvel at how newer technologies continue to transform our wonderful business, and how we will adapt and use them.

(Documentation: https://arxiv.org/abs/1508.06576)