{"id":509852,"date":"2018-10-10T09:00:17","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T16:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/?p=509852"},"modified":"2018-10-10T20:30:53","modified_gmt":"2018-10-11T03:30:53","slug":"workshop-yields-concrete-ai-solutions-for-advancing-societal-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/blog\/workshop-yields-concrete-ai-solutions-for-advancing-societal-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Workshop yields concrete AI solutions for advancing societal good"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-509855 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-1024x576.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-1066x600.png 1066w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-655x368.png 655w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-343x193.png 343w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788.png 1400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Artificial intelligence has made tremendous strides in recent years, but oftentimes, its potential to help tackle some of the world\u2019s most pressing issues is overshadowed by concerns and misunderstandings surrounding this growing technology. To focus on AI\u2019s potential for enabling social good, Microsoft Research India, in collaboration with the <a class=\"msr-external-link glyph-append glyph-append-open-in-new-tab glyph-append-xsmall\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cais.usc.edu\/\">University of Southern California Center for Artificial Intelligence in Society<span class=\"sr-only\"> (opens in new tab)<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0organized and hosted a two-day \u201cAI and Societal Good\u201d workshop on September 24\u201325 at Microsoft Research India\u2019s premises in Bangalore. The workshop, the second of its kind hosted by Microsoft Research India, focused on AI as an enabler for solving critical societal challenges, especially those impacting low-resource and vulnerable communities.<\/p>\n<p>To help identify focus areas, Microsoft Research India brought together a wide range of stakeholders, including social work researchers, policy organizations, nongovernmental organizations, and social enterprises. The first part of the workshop saw talks by researchers from Microsoft and USC presenting previous work on using AI technologies for societal good. This was followed by brainstorming sessions with participating NGOs and social enterprises to identify widespread problems. Through these discussions, five major application areas were identified:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>digitization and image recognition<\/li>\n<li>personalized health care<\/li>\n<li>urban planning<\/li>\n<li>public health awareness<\/li>\n<li>welfare of vulnerable youth<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The second part of the workshop focused on proposing solutions in each of these areas. In multiple breakout sessions, participants discussed ideas that could accelerate current efforts by local organizations and allow stakeholders to address key societal problems jointly. At the end of the workshop, teams of researchers and NGOs presented concrete project proposals for each of the five application areas.<\/p>\n<p>A consistent theme throughout these sessions was the importance of collaboration between AI researchers and experts from the social work sector in solving important problems. All of the proposed projects depend on creating effective AI systems, but more importantly require a deep understanding of the communities and localities these tools will serve. Each project team benefited from the interaction between researchers and practitioners, enabling discussion of the technical, social, and ethical challenges in the work.<\/p>\n<p>The workshop continued the progress made by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/event\/microsoft-research-india-workshop-on-ai-for-social-good\/\">previous year&#8217;s gathering<\/a> in creating a two-way dialogue between the AI and social work communities, and Microsoft Research India looks forward to reporting progress on these projects in the coming months. For more information and project updates as they become available, visit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/event\/microsoft-research-msr-india-workshop-on-ai-and-societal-good\/\">Microsoft Research India Workshop on AI and Societal Good<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Artificial intelligence has made tremendous strides in recent years, but oftentimes, its potential to help tackle some of the world\u2019s most pressing issues is overshadowed by concerns and misunderstandings surrounding this growing technology. To focus on AI\u2019s potential for enabling social good, Microsoft Research India, in collaboration with the University of Southern California Center for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37074,"featured_media":509855,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"msr-url-field":"","msr-podcast-episode":"","msrModifiedDate":"","msrModifiedDateEnabled":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","msr-author-ordering":[{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Amit Sharma","user_id":"30997"}],"msr_hide_image_in_river":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[241770],"tags":[],"research-area":[13556],"msr-region":[],"msr-event-type":[],"msr-locale":[268875],"msr-post-option":[],"msr-impact-theme":[],"msr-promo-type":[],"msr-podcast-series":[],"class_list":["post-509852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","msr-research-area-artificial-intelligence","msr-locale-en_us"],"msr_event_details":{"start":"","end":"","location":""},"podcast_url":"","podcast_episode":"","msr_research_lab":[],"msr_impact_theme":[],"related-publications":[],"related-downloads":[],"related-videos":[],"related-academic-programs":[],"related-groups":[],"related-projects":[],"related-events":[420093],"related-researchers":[{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Amit Sharma","user_id":30997,"display_name":"Amit Sharma","author_link":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/people\/amshar\/\" aria-label=\"Visit the profile page for Amit Sharma\">Amit Sharma<\/a>","is_active":false,"last_first":"Sharma, Amit","people_section":0,"alias":"amshar"}],"msr_type":"Post","featured_image_thumbnail":"<img width=\"960\" height=\"540\" src=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788.png\" class=\"img-object-cover\" alt=\"a group of people in a room\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788.png 1400w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-1066x600.png 1066w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-655x368.png 655w, https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MSRI-Workshop_AI_Site_10_2018_1400x788-343x193.png 343w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/>","byline":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/people\/amshar\/\" title=\"Go to researcher profile for Amit Sharma\" aria-label=\"Go to researcher profile for Amit Sharma\" data-bi-type=\"byline author\" data-bi-cN=\"Amit Sharma\">Amit Sharma<\/a>","formattedDate":"October 10, 2018","formattedExcerpt":"Artificial intelligence has made tremendous strides in recent years, but oftentimes, its potential to help tackle some of the world\u2019s most pressing issues is overshadowed by concerns and misunderstandings surrounding this growing technology. To focus on AI\u2019s potential for enabling social good, Microsoft Research India,&hellip;","locale":{"slug":"en_us","name":"English","native":"","english":"English"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37074"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=509852"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":510863,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509852\/revisions\/510863"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/509855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=509852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-research-area","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-area?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-region","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-region?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-event-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-event-type?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-locale","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-locale?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-post-option","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-post-option?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-impact-theme","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-impact-theme?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-promo-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-promo-type?post=509852"},{"taxonomy":"msr-podcast-series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-podcast-series?post=509852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}