Alibaba Cloud, the cloud-computing arm of Alibaba Group, is making artificial intelligence (AI) technology more accessible to businesses and organizations with the debut of an upgraded machine-learning platform. Called PAI 2.0, the platform, which launched in 2015, will "help customers easily deploy large-scale data mining and modeling," Alibaba Cloud said in a statement. Machine learning is a branch of AI that gives computers the ability to absorb information, discern patterns in data and adapt to new input without explicit programming. China's first publicly available machine-learning platform, PAI is a suite of tools and AI software algorithms that allows businesses without an AI background to make practical use of Alibaba Cloud's ET program, an "artificial brain" that the company is using to solve complex problems such as predicting the winner of a popular Chinese reality TV show and helping to ease traffic congestion in the city of Hangzhou, China. "In the past year, Alibaba Cloud has implemented a number of real-life AI applications for customers across industries," said Alibaba Cloud Chief Scientist Dr. Jingren Zhou.

The public cloud division of Chinese ecommerce company Alibaba Group today is introducing new artificial-intelligence (AI) services targeting two specific industries, health care and manufacturing. The Alibaba Cloud is touting an ET Medical Brain and an ET Industrial Brain, each of which encompasses a number of services. The latter will give companies tools for monitoring the production process, improving energy efficiency, and predicting when maintenance will be needed. Also today, Alibaba is announcing the launch of version 2.0 of its PAI machine learning service. Alibaba introduced the original PAI in 2015.

If you have a child in your life who is headed in the "IT" / "Computers" (or honestly any job that will come in five years), please consider this valuable guidance. I can't cover AI without at least touching on this thought: AI is going to wipe out humanity. To a super intelligence that is in control of the planet, we will appear to be the equivalent of how ants appear to us – mostly pests who get in the way, even as we express passing appreciation for their "primitive intelligence." It is important to understand two incredibly valuable definitions that I've paraphrased from the brilliant Yuval Noah Harari. People who express the thought above mix the two things. Absolutely no one can predict the future a hundred years out (I encourage you NOT to Google Mr. Harari's prediction about what he sees happening 300 years out).

A member of the Pink Eagles robotics team tests the team's robot. Coach Frank Tappen said the team, comprising female students from Ore Creek Middle School, is "ecstatic" about its win. "Our daughter and her friends first joined Wonder League thinking it would be a fun and engaging way to learn more about robotics, but what they discovered was so much more than that," Tappen said. "While solving this year's missions, the girls learned invaluable, lifelong skills about time management, group collaboration and contributing to their community. "By working closely as a team, they developed some pretty creative solutions.

When Andrew Ng, one of the world's leading thinkers on artificial intelligence, announced he would be stepping down from his position as chief scientist at Chinese Baidu, the company's stock dropped nearly 3 percent in just a few hours. It was a reflection not only of Ng's prominence and fame, but also of the importance investors have placed on the search giant's focus on AI. The technology has become a key element of the company's strategy, and Ng's departure comes at a time when Baidu is determined to double down on its AI efforts. Baidu has quickly reaffirmed its commitment to AI, naming Wang Haifeng, an expert in natural-language processing, as Ng's replacement. CEO Robin Li has recently written numerous opinion pieces in Chinese newspapers about the importance of developing AI expertise.

Few places evoke the rise and fall of Japan's industrial might than the head office of the Imperial Steel Works in Kitakyushu. The red brick Meiji Era building was the heart of the nation's first big steelworks. Kitakyushu, with nearly a million people, embodies the struggle of Japan's cities to adapt to a future where citizens are older, workers are fewer and many houses are emptying. The emblems of government efforts to revitalize the economy -- a billion-dollar airport, a robotics factory -- stand beside the empty lots, an idle blast furnace and shuttered shops. Five hours west of Tokyo by shinkansen, Kitakyushu lost over 15,000 people in the five years to 2015, more than any other city in the country apart from those evacuated because of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

Dubai will soon be introducing Artificial Intelligence (AI) in its government sectors, a media report said. A new Artificial Intelligence (AI) smart lab will soon begin training government officials to implement AI in a wide variety of tasks that will make lives easier, reported Khaleej Times. The lab, launched during a workshop by the Smart Dubai Office (SDO) and Smart Dubai Government Establishment, will begin training a batch of 200 persons next month, but will later on be open to researchers, students and the general public, said the report. "To move towards the future, we have to redefine government and embed AI in our services. We have no choice but to embrace technology," said Aisha Bint Butti Bin Bishr, Director-General of Smart Dubai Office.

America's manufacturing heyday is gone, and so are millions of jobs, lost to modernization. Despite what Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin might think, the National Bureau of Economic Research and Silicon Valley executives, among many others, know it's already happening. And a new report from PwC estimates that 38 percent of American jobs are at "high risk" of being replaced by technology within the next 15 years. But how soon automation will replace workers is not the real problem. The real threat to American jobs will come if China does it first.

The combination of face-mapping and video projections makes for a trippy experience. The technology transforms the human face into a canvas for digital art. When a bright red lightning bolt appeared on Lady Gaga's face during her David Bowie tribute at the Grammys last year, the projection mapping technique went from niche studios to a mainstream audience. Now, the studio behind that performance has dropped a visual experiment called Inori to demonstrate the pace and precision of a new system. Nobumichi Asai, creative director of a Japanese visual studio called WOW, is a new media artist who is known for experimenting with face-mapping and video projections.

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. and map publisher Zenrin Co. said Wednesday they will collaborate to develop safe flight routes for drones. Under the "drone highway" initiative, Tepco will offer information on its power grid network, such as locations of transmission towers, power poles and electric cables, for mapping on Zenrin's three-dimensional map database to create flight-support infrastructure for guiding drones. "Drone ports" to charge drones will also be set up. The two companies aim to launch the drone flight aid service in fiscal 2019, after conducting tests. A Tepco official said other power companies, telecommunication carriers and railways will be asked to join the drone highway initiative.