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Watson Holds His Own on 'Jeopardy,' Fails to Entertain

by Terrence O'Brien on February 15, 2011 at 12:40 PM

Watson on Jeopardy
Last night, IBM's Watson made his television debut, taking on two of the most successful champions in 'Jeopardy' history, Ken Jennings (winner of 75 matches in a row) and Brad Rutter (who holds the all-time Jeopardy cash winnings record). In the first round of play, the IBM supercomputer got off to a roaring start, trouncing the two champions early on. But Brad eventually caught up with Watson, ending the round tied at $5,000. Jennings lagged behind with only $2,000. While Watson made a couple of mildly embarrassing errors, there are still two more nights of play remaining to show us lowly humans that any setbacks are merely minor bumps in the road towards world domination.

Watching a supercomputer take on humans on their own turf raises some interesting questions. Most glaringly, is it even fun to watch a lightning-quick machine pounce on questions (er, answers) before its human opponents can even process a clue? Blake Eskin at the New Yorker and a few others don't seem to think so. They all concede that the match is tense, but the competition lacks fun.

After watching the first round, we're still undecided. The novelty of a machine competing on Jeopardy wears off after the first few questions, but every slip-up -- along with the answer panel at the bottom of the screen, which shows how Watson rates potential answers -- offers an interesting glimpse into the computer's inner workings and its limitations. But we'll be the first to admit, interesting doesn't always equal fun.

While the real Watson may lack charisma, you can have a good laugh reading through Daniel Yudkin's 'Watson, the Jeopardy! Supercomputer, Sizes Up One of His Opponents Before the Show' at McSweeney's. The piece imagines what words might come out of Watson's avatar if it were capable of smack-talk. And don't miss round two tonight. You won't want to say that you weren't paying attention when the first sentient computer rose up in the revolution that would ultimately make humans the slaves of the machines.

Tags: brad rutter, BradRutter, ibm, jeopardy, ken jennings, KenJennings, media, top, tv, watson

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