Author: Francesco Rulli

How the Italian Renaissance can help us enter the post-COVID-19-era.

I am looking at the financial crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic as an interesting parallel to what happened in the 14th Century when the European economy went into recession.

The Hundred Years’ War between England and France triggered a European crisis, particularly when King Edward III of England didn’t pay his debt to my home town, Florence. This forced the two largest Florentine banks, the Bardi and Peruzzi, to collapse. I see a parallel to the wars following 9/11 and the financial crisis of 2008.

The Black Plague was even more devastating, as it killed millions of people in Europe. Florence lost 50% of its population, and the plague triggered the revolt of the Florentine textile workers, the Ciompi, in 1378. I see this as the equivalent of the SARS and Covid-19 Pandemics with millions of people in social and business isolation.

The Black Plague resulted in labour shortages and higher wages, which then created a wealthier population. The new demand for products generated new financial systems and trading opportunities. The collapse of the Bardi and Peruzzi banks gave space to the Medici bank, powered by a new Double Ledger accounting system that allowed them to run a European-World-class banking network. I see a parallel with Bitcoin and other Blockchain solutions triggered by the 2008 financial crisis, and the introduction of Artificial Intelligence to improve productivity, Business, and Social Intelligence.

Renaissance banking families and political dynasties like the Medici family sponsored inventors like Brunelleschi and Leonardo Da Vinci, artists like Donatello and Michelangelo. I believe that learning from the Italian Renaissance will help us propel humanity into a new Renaissance leveraging the Arts, Culture, Spirituality, Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence.

With Power comes Responsibility, and this is why organizations that hold knowledge must take the responsibility to guide the world out of this crisis, and ignite a new Renaissance. This is why Querlo partnered with The Opera del Duomo of Florence, combining its customized Artificial Intelligence solutions with 700 years of Arts, Culture, and Spirituality. You can read more about my perspective on this matter in this article I published back in 2014 when we established payments in Bitcoin to reward high-school female students in Afghanistan. If you have comments and suggestions or if you want to contribute with your perspective, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me at fr@querlo.com.

Please visit www.Querlo.com/chat/opera to learn more about what we are doing and take the opportunity to ask great questions to the artists of the Renaissance, this will allow us to train our NLU (natural language understanding) and give a new life to artists and inventors like Brunelleschi, Michelangelo, Donatello and Leonardo Da Vinci. Grazie!

The stoic decision of Italians on how they are defeating Covid-19

I took this picture of the Perseus with the Head of the Medusa by Benvenuto Cellini at the Loggia dei Lanzi in Piazza della Signoria

Italy has declared a Quarantine for the entire country to fight the Coronavirus Covid-19 emergency. The people dying of Covid-19 in Italy have an average age of 81 years old, they were born in the late 1930’s, right in the middle of World War II, and they rebuilt this wonderful country making it possible for Humanity to access its beauty and history. This Quarantine has a devastating impact on the country’s economy and people’s personal emotions, but it is also the best choice the Italians could have done to preserve their identity and pride to exist.

Italians have a strong understanding of the intellectual and historical value of elderly people. Indeed, older people are a fundamental of Italian society providing wisdom, but also a source of contention.

What Italians are doing is stoic. I would like to take a second to explain what Stoic means, quoting Wikipedia: Stoicism is a philosophy of personal ethics informed by its system of logic and its views on the natural world. According to its teachings, as social beings, the path to eudaimonia (happiness, or blessedness) for humans is found in accepting the moment as it presents itself, by not allowing oneself to be controlled by the desire for pleasure or fear of pain, by using one’s mind to understand the world and to do one’s part in nature’s plan, and by working together and treating others fairly and justly.

Another fundamental aspect of Stoicism is the relationship with Ethics: For the Stoics, reason meant not only using logic but also understanding the processes of nature—the logos or universal reason, inherent in all things. Living according to reason and virtue, they held, is to live in harmony with the divine order of the universe, in recognition of the common reason and essential value of all people.

When I see that politicians in other countries are more concerned about the economic impact than the lives of the people affected by this tragedy, I realize their passive existence, lack of stoicism, and disconnect with the Universal reason. It is now obvious why Italy is the country with the most UNESCO World Heritage Sites, is the cradle of the Renaissance and host of 70% of the historical value of the World, providing a deep connection between history and human values and Universal reason.

Just like Perseus beheaded the Medusa, the Italians will defeat Covid-19.

Share with me your thoughts about Italy: www.querlo.com/chat/italy

Maintain social distance.

You can’t handle the truth…about your (artificial) intelligence

I am here to deliver you bad news. Just like raising children has been, and will be, an expensive endeavour, it will be an expensive endeavour educating your (artificial) intelligence. We are not going to sugar coat this, we are here to tell you the truth. Can you handle the truth?

Imagine the entire knowledge-base of your company digitalized and transformed into an interactive intelligence that can interact with employees, customers, investors, and even students or random visitors. Imagine if this knowledge-base could ask questions, provide answers, and improve based on those interactions.

You will realize immediately that your knowledge-base is not able to handle the variety and diversity of questions and suggestions. It’s at that point that you will have to step up to the plate and invest in improving your knowledge-base, policies, and best practice. 

Our solution will save you a lot of time, but will also force you and your team to develop better and better knowledge-base. You will start with a 40% success rate, it will climb to 50%, 60%, 70%, and it will stabilize at 80%, slowing down your progress and driving you crazy! Once you will get to that 80%, you will be able to say that you have started the process of Digitalization of your company and that now, finally! your company has an intelligent knowledge-base, which adapts to employee and market needs. In essence, even if you and some of your executives drop dead or run away, there is a process in place that allows your to company to learn and grow. Isn’t this what you want for your children?

Investors (Humans) will really appreciate this for many reasons; including some listed here below:

Employees (Humans) will not fulfil repetitive tasks but will use and develop their wisdom and use real and proprietary data.

Buyers (both Humans and Robots evaluating the purchase your company) will see an opportunity to scale the process to bigger numbers or diverse markets and solutions.

Partners (both Humans and Robots) will tag along and comply with your process escalating value for both.

Customers (Humans) will feel appreciated, protected and taken care of 24/7 and without an attitude. 

If you can handle the truth, reach out to me and let’s talk.

The only thing we can’t buy is time

The only thing we can’t buy back is our time, from the day we are born our days are counted. The life expectancy of a US citizen is 77.8 years*, which accounts for about 28,397 days, Italians make it to 82.7 years* which accounts for an extra 1788.50 days.

We spend up to 28%** of the professional time reading emails, dedicating much of our very precious time to repetitive tasks that can be managed by an AI-powered digital assistant. At Querlo we started building AI-powered digital assistants and chatbots in 2014, as of today we designed hundreds of different solutions empowering thousands of use cases.

During this journey we learned a few things:

a) Digital transformation starts from within the company, that is why it is important that HR embraces this transformation to inspire other departments.

b) Educating employees to use and leverage Artificial Intelligence is a benefit for both the company and the employee on a personal level.

c) Robots and machines were created to provide humans more freedom to execute valuable and fulfilling tasks, improve happiness and spend more time with the loved once.

The “quantity” of money generated by a business is no longer the measure of success, today success is based on the “quality” of time spent being productive, providing happiness to the communities surrounding us.

If you want to learn more about our journey in this space don’t hesitate to reach out to me.

Francesco Rulli 

“There is nothing greater in life than empowering others to succeed. Artificial Intelligence is my tool of choice to help people achieve their personal aspirations.” 

• Forbes AI Solutions, Partner • Worldwide

• Querlo, AI with a 💖, Global CEO • New York • Florence • Dubai • Taiwan

• The Marketing Society, Global Ambassador

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy

**https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/technology-media-and-telecommunications/our-insights/the-social-economy

Intelligence is not about what you know but about what you don’t know.

Companies, institutions, buildings, infrastructures, are as “smart” as their capacity to learn.

Querlo provides Artificial Intelligence solutions to empower companies to learn from people, maintain an ever-green conversation, and grow exponentially the company’s intelligence (data, skills and inspiration).

The ability of Querlo, the artificial intelligence with a 💖, to measure sentiment and emotion, allows to humanize artificial intelligence and foster an intimate relationship between humans and bots, motivating humans to educate the artificial intelligence and constantly improve.

Let me clarify, this is not just about Artificial Intelligence helping humans to have a better experience but it is about humans educating Artificial Intelligence to improve and consequently provide them with a better experience.

Does your company have a digital portal that facilitates a fluid conversation between the company and people? Or does it still rely on a static order or contact form? Today this can be done with touch screen in the lobby of a building or an airport, a voice-activated speaker, or a web-based chatbot, to mention a few options.

Can clients and employee contribute to the company intelligence sharing their stories and experience? Your company might have millions of clients but how deep is your company’s intelligence and capacity to learn from them? Facebook’s and Amazon’s success is based on their capacity to learn from people and build a compelling first-party database leveraging third party content and products. Profits come as a consequence of their intelligence, quantity and quality of data

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I just spent two weeks in Dubai where I interacted with several “people” of the hospitality industry, but, because of their lack of curiosity and their obsession of their own brand, they failed to learn from me, the customer with real-life experience.

A Hotel can interact with me with touch screens located in the lobby, and learn that I am a passionate sailor and that I just raced in a regatta in Dubai, this information could be stored in their CRM (customer relationship management), and could allow the Hotel to customize my experience when I enter my room, with beautiful images of sailing races on my TV screen and an invite to sail at the Marina. At the hotel where I stayed in Dubai, I am considered a VIP client but nobody from the management took the time to engage on a genuine conversation with me, maybe it is time for them to program a truly intelligent chatbot with a 💖!

The restaurant can learn that I am originally from Tuscany and my contribution to them is an evaluation of the Extra Virgin Olive Oil quality along with the quality of their Mediterranean dishes offered on their menu. How disappointing when this week the waitress of a very nice Mediterranean restaurant failed to ask me and my guests where we are from, indeed a team of businesspeople from Italy, India and Switzerland, a true treasure of perspectives and experiences.

The coffee shop can learn from me on the ideal temperature for a cappuccino and the appropriate amount of milk and foam, including, discover the reason why it is called “Cappuccino”. The coffee should be hot while the milk and foam luck warm, Cappuccino are inspired by the colours of the clothes of the Cappuccini monks. This is not just a coffee but a true experience of cultural value.

With Querlo, those conversations can be held in the intimacy of a conversation between a person and a bot, outside the indiscreet eyes of social media, preserving the privacy of both parties, the people and the companies (bots).

  • Can a company appreciate human skills and expertise? 
  • Can a company learn and mould the experience accordingly and in real-time? 

This is what we call Conversational Marketing, Conversational Commerce, Conversational Experience, where the conversation fuels the intelligence, and the intelligence shapes the experience. 

Querlo is created by a team of passionate Italian and American consultants and technologists who empower companies and institutions to learn from humans, and get smarter with artificial intelligence “with a 💖”.

Someone very special just walked through the lobby of your building or just held your product in their hands, and your company failed to establish a conversation and learn more about who they are and what they are passionate about, this was a loss. Carpe Diem!

You must empower your company of cognitive learning artificial intelligence with a sincere interest in what people are passionate about and measuring with the attention of their sentiments and emotions to fuel an everlasting engaging conversation. 

I live my life by a simple philosophy: “If you are the smartest person in the room, you are in the wrong room!”, I believe that companies should live by the same philosophy.