It is artificial intelligence on steroids, an algorithm that learns and computes images, speech, translations, texts, and find direct and indirect relationships between these properties. here a video that speaks a little more about it
I believe that the future of search will be AI. It has to be, humans make mistakes and to be able to advance and give search transparency it much deserves it has to be artificial intelligence. But will it be harder to rank organically? I really think it will pick and choose what it likes depending on what makes it better for the searcher. Will it make it fair? in my opinion yes! No more Spamming, PBN’s, and black hole of back links that really rank websites with poor UX/UI, Content and “sense of purpose”.
Google algorithm changes have really changed the way sites currently rank. If you read my Rand Fishkin Post about the Virus of Good quality content, it goes way beyond text. Its about your sites UX/UI, Color Schemes, Content, Images, Page Speed. Lets see in the coming years or even month what Google is cooking up at their lab when it comes to machine learning.
Want to see machine learning in action? Check out Smart List a re-marketing list that is created in Google that uses your Conversion data to determine the best list and deliver even more conversions.
Resources:
http://research.google.com/pubs/ArtificialIntelligenceandMachineLearning.html
http://searchengineland.com/machine-learning-adwords-scripts-google-prediction-api-217936