"In January 2018, advocates for data privacy celebrated when the Chinese government released a new national standard on the protection of personal information, which contains more comprehensive and onerous requirements than even the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation, per analysis by some experts." In the decades ahead, the countries that dominate AI in any domain could influence how our world is shaped. Jeff Ding leads research on China's development of artificial intelligence at the Future of Humanity Institute's Governance of AI Program at Oxford University. He's been interested in studying China since his high school years. Ding says that once he realized the potential of AI, he became more interested in China's investment in this area. Ding's new study, Deciphering China's AI Dream, is a detailed analysis of the country's AI strategy moving forward.

Welcome to the 21st century, where a request for extra towels in your hotel room may be answered by a roughly 4-foot-high purple robot on wheels. Miami YotelPad -- an unfinished 30-story mixed-use development in downtown Miami -- will employ three robot butlers for its guests. These robots don't look like humans (thankfully?), but they're programmed to execute tasks normally left to their biological counterparts: delivering room service, playing music and even engaging in conversation. No one covers what is happening in our community better than we do. And with a digital subscription, you'll never miss a local story.

Tech giant Google today said it is working with multiple partners to use new-age technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to improve response time to natural disasters like floods as well as addressing healthcare challenges. Google Technical Project Manager (TensorFlow) Anitha Vijayakumar said the company has developed a system that uses AI for early and accurate flood warnings, including guiding over areas that are dangerous and prone to flooding. Earlier this year, Google had partnered with India's Ministry of Water Resources on a pilot for flood warning based on AI and ML. She said the pilot was undertaken in areas prone to flooding and the "initial results are promising". Vijayakumar said the pilot can be extended to other parts of the country and expressed hope that the system will eventually be "able to give longer lead times to people, helping them seek safety".

What's possible with 3D printing is largely driven by two things: How patient you are, since printing large or complex structures can take a while, and what kind of build volume you have to work with. Most 3D printers are boxes, and inside those boxes are smaller boxes, and inside those boxes are the area in which a thing can be printed. If your thing is larger than that box, you've either got to print it in pieces that can be assembled later, buy yourself a new printer, or give up entirely. You can certainly 3D print very large things, but there are still usually build volume constraints. We've seen examples of robot arms that can print anywhere they can reach, as well as gantry systems that can print structures like houses, as long as the structures are slightly smaller than they are.

Uber has been seeking ways to lower development costs and losses in its autonomous-vehicle unit following a fatal crash involving one of its cars earlier this year in Arizona. Last year, the Uber division spent about $750 million on self-driving car development before making cuts this year, according to people familiar with the matter. In recent months, Uber has closed its Arizona autonomous-vehicle operations and laid off about 400 test drivers, some of whom it will rehire after undergoing new training. Uber also has taken its self-driving vehicles off the roads in the San Francisco Bay Area, Pittsburgh and Toronto while investigators look into the circumstances of the Arizona crash. For ride-sharing concerns like Uber and Lyft Inc., autonomous vehicles could cut their biggest expense: paying human drivers.

Twenty years ago Lego introduced Mindstorms as a way to engage kids who were becoming more interested in video games and the internet than plastic building blocks. It was successful enough that the kits became a regular sight in robotics classes and competitions. Now the line is on its fourth generation, and it's been joined by other STEM-friendly Lego kits like Boost and Powered Up to bring tech skills to many different types of kids. Now Lego's educational division goes even younger with Coding Express, a set that will teach 3- and 4-year-olds the basics of programming while they construct a world of trains, picnics and wandering deer. This isn't going to teach your kids popular coding languages like Python or Swift. Coding Express is firmly for the preschool crowd, so the idea here is to just get kids acclimated to concepts like loops and subprograms.

Google Go, the tech giant's search app optimized for emerging markets, can now read this article out loud. In fact, the company has updated its browser with the ability to read web pages in 28 different languages using a natural sounding voice that works even on a 2G connection. The tech giant has announced the new feature at its annual event in India, which is one of the markets Android Go was created for. According to Google, the app's new ability uses AI to determine the most important parts of a web page -- it will only read those sections and leave out everything else. For instance, if it's reading a cooking blog, users don't have to listen to it drone on and on about a writer's life story before reaching the recipe itself.

Most role playing games live and die by the characters and the stories they weave. The decades-old Dragon Quest series has reached its 11th iteration, and Dragon Quest XI attempts to both both celebrate the series so far, and court a new audience. And if any RPG series is ripe for new fans, it's Dragon Quest. Square Enix has primed players with both its Minecraft-esque Builders series and Dragon Quest Heroes, which borrows the grand scale battles of KOEI's Dynasty Warriors series. But this is the meat-and-potatoes Dragon Quest that fans know and love.

The Japanese government is teaming up with businesses and academia to set up hospitals enhanced by artificial intelligence, seeking to allow short-handed doctors to spend more time on patient care while curbing medical spending. The government is expected to invest more than $100 million in the effort over half a decade, with a target of establishing 10 model hospitals by the end of fiscal 2022. AI will help with tasks from updating patients' charts to analyzing tests and parsing images to help with diagnoses. The effort aims to address structural challenges to health care, including the chronic lack of doctors and nurses in some areas and rising medical expenses. The initiative will also help make Japan more competitive on the world stage, giving AI development a shot in the arm and helping boost exports of medical equipment. Three ministries central to the effort -- the education, industry and health ministries -- will recruit participating companies and hospitals this month, targeting AI specialists and medical equipment makers.

Stocks gained further ground, albeit slightly, on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Tuesday, after a new U.S.-Mexico trade deal eased investor concerns over global trade friction. The 225-issue Nikkei average edged up 13.83 points, or 0.06 percent, to end at 22,813.47 after briefly rising above the 23,000 mark for the first time in two and a half months. The key market yardstick extended its winning streak to a sixth session, after adding 197.87 points on Monday. The Topix index of all first-section issues closed up 2.68 points, or 0.16 percent, at 1,731.63. It advanced 19.75 points the previous day.