[bashedly]

I'm hoping someone closer to the WolframAlpha team and work can shed some light on this - but is the extensive use of the first person warranted here? There's an awful lot of "I" and "I've".

Is the work being done really so directly attributable to Stephen Wolfram or is there a army of hard working individuals behind the scenes not being referenced here? I'm not suggesting they list everyone by name or anything, but a simple shift to something like "our team" would seem more generous. Of course this is all moot if he is indeed primarily or almost solely responsible for the progress being referenced.

[TeMPOraL]

It's Standard Wolfram Style. You can see the same pattern in his "New Kind of Science" book - an interesting piece of writing, but the amount of "I", "I've", "my", etc. is plain distracting.

[gooseus]

I understand so little of the topics of that book or this review, yet still very much enjoyed reading the takedown:

http://bactra.org/reviews/wolfram/

"So much for substance. Let me turn to the style, which is that of monster raving egomania, beginning with the acknowledgments..."

[Zikes]

The gist of the article is that he sees AI as being so staggeringly complex that English will not be sufficient to communicate with it clearly, but that Wolfram Language might work. Since Wolfram Language is largely his project, a few first person pronouns are to be expected.

[gohrt]

Wolfram employeees sign contracts giving Dr Wolfram credit for their work, in exchange for their pay.

[bashedly]

I know this is overly idealistic, but it seems to me that paying for "credit" (especially in terms of research) seems "wrong". I understand paying for ownership of the results of someone's work, or paying to state that the broader organization takes credit for the body of work produced by the employees. But for one individual to pay to personally receive credit for the output of another seems blatantly dishonest.

[jjaredsimpson]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77Y6CIyyBcI

That's what the money is for

[carlob]

Wolfram Research has several hundred employees. Obviously he doesn't do all of the work, but he is involved in a lot of the design. Not that I necessarily agree with the style either.