IBM Deep Blue Defeats Kasparov (1997)
IBM's Deep Blue supercomputer defeated world chess champion Garry Kasparov 3.5-2.5 in a rematch after Kasparov had won their first match in 1996. The computer analyzed 200 million positions per second. IBM retired Deep Blue to the Smithsonian immediately after victory.
Headlines declared machines had conquered human intelligence. IBM's stock price rose. Kasparov accused IBM of cheating and demanded a rematch that never came.
Chess AI became commodity software within years. The match proved machines could beat humans at narrow tasks but said little about general intelligence. IBM never commercialized Deep Blue.
Google faces similar questions: Does beating benchmarks translate to practical value? IBM's victory was a publicity triumph that failed to become a product. Google is attempting the opposite—using benchmark success to drive subscriptions and scientific adoption.
