Following on from the discovery of Samsung's Bixby AI assistant, the South Korean company has provided more evidence that the service will be available in the near future. As part of promoting Samsung Pay on its own website, Samsung's webmasters uploaded a picture detailing three options on how to pay for goods: "Shopping, Mini, and Bixby". 'Bixby' is believed to be a voice-powered digital assistant (see here on Forbes). The assistant is expected to be used by all of Samsung's first-party applications, including the Samsung web browser, Samsung's PIM software and as is now apparent Samsung Pay. It's not clear yet if Bixby will ship with the upcoming flagship handset, although it's the sort of service that feels like a great fit to promote alongside the launch of the Galaxy S8.

Matthew Peterson is a pretty inspirational guy. As a dyslexic child he found math class difficult, so as an adult he resolved to totally change the way math is taught. After completing his studies in biology, electrical engineering, and Chinese language and literature at the University of California, Irvine, Peterson co-founded the nonprofit MIND Research Institute and set about developing "Spatial Temporal (ST) Math," a computer game-based method of teaching that doesn't rely on language as a medium. Instead it uses spatial-temporal reasoning--the ability to move stuff around in your mind and work out how it fits together. Proponents point to recent findings in neuroscience and education research--showing that early music training can enhance spatial-temporal reasoning, for example--as justification for this shift.

As a young reporter writing about technology in the mid-nineteen-nineties, I got my hands on a Nokia phone. It was small, gray, and a bit heavy, with the usual twelve-button keypad that was part of every phone interface. From a crowded New York street, I made a call to my mother in India. It was expensive--a few dollars per minute--but the fact of that call was life-changing. I walked back to the office, pondering the possibility of work and communication anywhere, not chained to the phone in our homes or at our desks.

Every gaming year's most anticipated list feels like a mashup of aspiration and prudence, a medley of punchy independent efforts squaring off with titanic franchises designed to reel in loyal fans by the gazillions. Not that sequels have to be stale. I can't wait to try Mass Effect: Andromeda, for example, after the triumphs of Dragon Age: Inquisition. Halo Wars 2 revisits the original Xbox 360 game's laudable, subversive approach to a genre generally inseparable from keyboard and mouse. The Persona games practically make reinvention their watchword.

You may never have heard of diabetic retinopathy, but this nasty condition is the fastest-growing cause of blindness in the world. It poses a risk to the 415 million people with diabetes--nearly 5 percent of the world's population. The condition occurs when chronically high blood sugar damages the tiny vessels that provide blood to the retina. People who suffer from diabetic retinopathy can begin to experience distorted vision and ultimately go blind. And here's the even deeper tragedy: Diabetic retinopathy can be prevented; it just needs to be detected early. With so many people at risk of this condition, the world simply doesn't have enough ophthalmologists available to diagnose them, especially in developing countries.

As you've probably heard, Masayoshi Son, the cunning founder of SoftBank, announced last fall he was raising a $100 billion Vision Fund to back a broad set of transformative companies in artificial intelligence, robotics and other sectors. In Silicon Valley, the news is still resonating. Venture capitalists invested only $79 billion into startups in all of 2015 and were on track to do about the same in 2016. So Son is bringing a bazooka to a gun fight, and the effects will likely be felt here over the next few years. Now we're starting to learn a little bit more about Son's backers in this effort, thanks largely to some of my colleagues.

Picture source: ThinkStock Zenith has unveiled 10 trends that show how Artificial Intelligence (AI) will help to power the consumer journey in 2017, driving engagement opportunities and effectiveness for marketers. AI is the ability of machines or computers to emulate human thinking or decision making. A key area within AI is machine learning and Zenith's 2017 trends build on the network's groundbreaking automation of digital planning, unveiled earlier this year. Using bespoke algorithms, a team of data scientists and strategists from Zenith developed sophisticated machine learning technology that enabled the network to create an'automation loop': data collection, attribution and planning changes across multiple touchpoints – all done automatically. Tanmay Mohanty, Group CEO of Zenith India said that the year 2017 appears full of possibilities.

Turning a space into a home is a process akin to alchemy. It's a combination of objects (old, new, inherited, broken, and sometimes of mysterious origin) and an investment of emotional energy. Space does not become a home overnight. It's worked and kneaded, left to rise. It is gradual, and then it is a sudden realisation that becomes magically real: this house is now mine.

The machines haven't taken over. However, they are seeping their way into our lives, affecting how we live, work and entertain ourselves. From voice-powered personal assistants like Siri and Alexa, to more underlying and fundamental technologies such as behavioral algorithms, suggestive searches and autonomously-powered self-driving vehicles boasting powerful predictive capabilities, there are several examples and applications of artificial intellgience in use today. However, the technology is still in its infancy. What many companies are calling A.I. today, aren't necessarily so.

We've all heard the buzz surrounding 5G: How it will be an amazing upgrade of our wireless infrastructure. How we'll be able to stream 8k video without buffering as we ride through the city in our driverless cars. Certainly, the promise of 5G sounds pretty exciting. The capabilities of 5G will spawn new applications and innovations, which in turn will spur opportunities for economic growth, by transforming once disconnected industries into connected, automated systems that improve diverse sectors such as healthcare, transportation, construction, energy and manufacturing through enhanced productivity and efficiency. It will not only evolve our wireless networks, it will create new applications that will drive transformational impacts.