The Orangutan looked quite magnificent. From her inquisitive eyes to her distinctive orange fur, she was just the sort of creature nature lovers adore watching on TV. But a closer inspection revealed something a little different about her. That's because she is actually an undercover robot, fitted with high-definition cameras behind her glass eyes and used to infiltrate the animal kingdom. The orangutan, as well as an adorable wolf-cub, an utterly convincing meerkat and an incredible floating otter are among 34 animatronic beasts created for the BBC's new series, Spy In The Wild.

In fact, in many countries, the internet, the very thing that was supposed to smash down the walls of authoritarianism like a sledgehammer of liberty, has been instead been co-opted by those very regimes in order to push their own agendas while crushing dissent and opposition. And with the emergence of conversational AI -- the technology at the heart of services like Google's Allo and Jigsaw or Intel's Hack Harassment initiative -- these governments could have a new tool to further censor their citizens. Turkey, Brazil, Egypt, India and Uganda have all shut off internet access when politically beneficial to their ruling parties. Nations like Singapore, Russia and China all exert outsize control over the structure and function of their national networks, often relying on a mix of political, technical and social schemes to control the flow of information within their digital borders. The effects of these policies are self-evident.

Melville, NY (PRWEB) January 17, 2017 – Nastel Technologies, a global provider of enterprise-grade operations analytics and application performance monitoring (APM) solutions, announced the next-generation version of its flagship software platform, AutoPilot Insight 2.0. According to Charley Rich, VP Product Management "The new release fuses predictive anomaly and machine learning capabilities, business transaction tracking that spans corporate firewalls, raw information handling and analytics speed, and the flexibility to operate across dynamic IT environments--from mobile to mainframe. It provides the broad array of capabilities needed by developers, IT admins, and business analysts for enterprise-grade operations intelligence and APM." Rich said building a solution that fully addresses today's client requirements demanded two years of ground-up product re-engineering. "Customers universally remarked that they needed to find data outliers faster and sense problem conditions before they actually affect users. They also wanted more powerful end-to-end transaction tracking capabilities, with the ability to tie transaction performance to business outcomes."

Millions around the globe may have taken to the streets in recent years to protest against the impact of globalisation on their jobs and communities - but this backlash is only likely to grow as globalisation itself becomes more disruptive. The stark warning comes from Richard Baldwin, president of the Centre for Economic Policy Research think-tank, who has been studying global trade for the past 30 years. Technological advances could now mean white-collar, office-based workers and professionals are at risk of losing their jobs, Prof Baldwin argues. In the US, voter anger with globalisation may have led to Donald Trump's election victory, but those who voted for him could be disappointed as his aim of bringing back jobs is unlikely to work, says Prof Baldwin, who also worked as an economist under President George HW Bush. Protectionist trade barriers won't work in the 21st Century, he says.

Iranian-born bioengineer researcher Nima Enayati works on a robotic surgery machine during an interview with the Associated Press at the Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017. An Iranian researcher at Milan's Polytechnic University, Enayati was refused check-in Monday at Milan's Malpensa Airport for his U.S.-bound flight on Turkish Airlines after the Trump administration's executive order came down. Iranian-born bioengineer researcher Nima Enayati works on a robotic surgery machine during an interview with the Associated Press at the Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017. An Iranian researcher at Milan's Polytechnic University, Enayati was refused check-in Monday at Milan's Malpensa Airport for his U.S.-bound flight on Turkish Airlines after the Trump administration's executive order came down. Iranian-born bioengineer researcher Nima Enayati stands as he works on a robotic surgery machine during an interview with the Associated Press at the Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017.

When I was a kid dreaming of being a game developer, I hoped that in the future I'd be joining a large studio and working on a blockbuster title. Things didn't quite pan out that way. After leaving university with a fellow student, I am now the co-founder of my own company, Vlambeer, renowned for successful game releases such as Nuclear Throne and Ridiculous Fishing. I was born in the Netherlands, the son of an Egyptian immigrant and a Dutch mother, and was raised as a proud Muslim. For the past years, much of my travel to the United States has led to secondary selection, investigation, or interrogation.

The new book, Power Play: How Video Games Can Save The World, by Asi Burak and Laura Parker, was just released. Asi is well known in the game world as the creator of PeaceMaker and the former executive director of Games For Change. For quite a while now, he has been the go-to source for understanding the social impact gaming movement. But what really struck me is how clearly the book expresses the possibilities that still lie ahead for digital play. When I finished reading it, I was clearly reminded that the video game industry is still in it's infancy.

President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration and green card holders from several majority-Muslim countries earned widespread response this weekend with protests and legal action. Among game industry companies and developers, their response was similarly vocal. In a statement, industry trade group the Entertainment Software Association strongly came out against the order. "The Entertainment Software Association urges the White House to exercise caution with regard to vital immigration and foreign worker programs. As a leading force in technology and exporter of entertainment, the U.S. video game industry thrives on the contributions of innovators and storytellers from around the world," the Software Association's statement said.

Artificial intelligence is no longer the stuff of science fiction and Hollywood movies. So many works of film and fiction are hooked on the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and what it might mean for humanity. They are often apocalyptic tales – Blade Runner, Alien, Terminator – where mankind comes off badly. But now that AI is being spearheaded by internet giants such as Google, Microsoft and Amazon, and our daily lives are increasingly affected by AI systems – chat bots, purchase prediction, news generation – what will really happen? In 2015 the UK media widely picked up on American media organisation NPR's calculator that could predict which jobs are susceptible to computerisation.

Boss Sundar Pichai asked employees to fly back to the US ASAP. The President's executive order that bans almost all citizens from Iran, Sudan, Syria, Iraq, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the country is making tech execs move fast. Google's Sundar Pichai told overseas employees to fly back to the US as soon as possible, or risk not being able to get back at all. The immigration order also saw companies like Apple and Microsoft rush to help employees stranded following the restrictions. Surgeons were able to perform a difficult eye procedure with some robotic help.