[omarhaneef]

Machine Learning is not a single thing that can be useful or not.

It is more like the scientific method. It depends on the data available, and whether something in the arsenal can create something useful.

Most experiments yield absolutely nothing, and some achieve delightfully counter-intuitive useful results.

The criticism on HN -- perhaps correct(1) -- is not that it is hype but that it is not new. Is statistics great? of course, but its been around for decades, perhaps centuries, so it seems strange to proclaim how it will solve problems now.

(1) ML can be distinguished from statistics if you want to. I am not interested in this particular debate myself.