So while people will always try to build C-3PO-style machines that look and talk like us, the real advances will come in individual components we design to do one job well. Human intelligence arose from the unconscious co-operation of such systems to sustain the organism. Maybe if we get the constituent ‘smart’ parts right, a true AI system will spontaneously evolve — dare we say it — intelligently…

It’s the distributors and studios that are going to save money — by not having to earmark hundreds of millions to send a movie around the world as they do currently.

If you’d invested in Titanic (1998) you would have received a little over $9 for every dollar you put in (900 percent ROI). For Crocodile Dundee (1986), USD$13 (1,300 percent ROI). For The Blair Witch Project (1999, the first sleeper hit of the web age), a whopping USD$7,103 (710,300 percent).