Sahil Dhull, founder of an AI-wearables start-up and a human-computer interaction researcher, has said the interface, not the model, has become the real bottleneck in artificial intelligence.
Addressing students during a seminar at Hartron Skill Centre, Yamunanagar, Dhull argued that every era of computing had been defined by humans interaction with machines rather than the machines themselves.
Tracing the shift from punch cards to keyboards, mice and touchscreens, he said each transition changed who could use computers. “Every 10 to 15 years, a new interface emerges, and the entire industry reorganises around it,” he explained, adding that the next such shift was beginning, though most people haven’t noticed it yet.
A 2020 Computer Science graduate from IIT-Kanpur, Dhull, who holds a US patent from his work at Adobe Research, has built systems at Cohesity in the Bay Area, and developed proactive AI agents at Sonatic, a venture backed by Andreessen Horowitz’s Speedrun programme.
According Dhull, AI has largely overcome limits on what machines can do; the challenge now is how quickly humans can communicate intent. “It is the rate-limiting step between human intent and machine’s action,” he said.
On wearables, Dhull noted that devices like Google Glass and Snap Spectacles failed due to user experience and not due to hardware.
Centre head Sanjeev Galhotra and Rajeev Galhotra thanked Dhull for an insightful session.
