"Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" is expected to rule the box office during the long Christmas weekend, despite a glut of new films jostling for moviegoers' dollars. The second weekend for the Lucasfilm prequel is expected to easily top newcomers, including the new animated musical "Sing," the romance-in-space drama "Passengers" and the video-game action flick "Assassin's Creed." "Rogue One," released by the Walt Disney Co., dominated last weekend with $155 million in U.S.-Canada box office, making it the third-highest opening of the year. Driven by strong reviews and high anticipation among the Jedi fanbase, the space saga could add $130 million or more in domestic receipts during the six-day weekend that starts Wednesday, according to analysts. Internationally, "Rogue One" has already earned $151 million for a global total of $323.5 million so far.

It started in 1986, in the sort of castle you'd expect one of its characters to climb. In the three decades since it improbably took up within the halls of a 19th century neo-Renaissance Brittany keep, French multinational games publisher Ubisoft has turned out some of gaming's grandest franchises. From Rayman's ghost-limbed antics to the tactically encyclopedic Tom Clancy games, the crypto-byzantine Assassin's Creed series' edgy roof-running to Just Dance's infectious bust-a-moves, Ubisoft has turned quirky, technically involuted concepts into industry exemplars. TIME recently spoke with Ubisoft cofounder, chairman and CEO Yves Guillemot about the company's origins, what he's learned about overreaching, recent threats of hostile takeovers, what interactivity means for the future of the species, and why, of all things, a castle. Actually, the fact that I was surrounded by brilliant and creative people. Brilliant and creative people were really what helped me to continue to go forward.

Bayesian Reasoning and Machine Learning by David Barber has a chapter on Approximate Sampling Christophe Andrieu et al. have written an introductory tutorial (pdf) on MCMC methods that covers most of the MCMC algorithms Dr. Daphne Koller offers an online course on Coursera, Probabilistic Graphical Models, which also covers the Gibbs Sampler and the Metropolis-Hastings Algorithm Dr. A. Taylan Cemgil has prepared very useful lecture notes (pdf) for his Monte Carlo methods course

Building the AI'butler' is Zuckerberg's personal challenge for 2016 The 31-year-old said: 'You can think of it kind of like J.A.R.V.I.S in Iron Man' His plans include teaching the assistant to let friends into his home by looking at their faces when they ring the doorbell, for example Building the AI'butler' is Zuckerberg's personal challenge for 2016 The 31-year-old said: 'You can think of it kind of like J.A.R.V.I.S in Iron Man' The video shows Zuckerberg using the Jarvis AI throughout the day for everything from getting dressed to making toast. Watch as Nasa shake tests the Orion capsule that could take... Airlines add'fire containment bags' for overheating phones... Google and Facebook to install giant 8,000-mile internet... EXCLUSIVE: Royal Navy trials robot spy boats that can scour... Watch as Nasa shake tests the Orion capsule that could take... Airlines add'fire containment bags' for overheating phones... Google and Facebook to install giant 8,000-mile internet... EXCLUSIVE: Royal Navy trials robot spy boats that can scour... The AI is able to do everything from recognise friend's faces at the door to work out who is asking it questions - and Zuckerberg said he's even connected up a 1950s toaster and a t-shirt cannon to it. Zuckerberg also programmed the system to play music. Zuckerberg's daughter, Max is also able to use the AI to play. The project is modelled on the J.A.R.V.I.S. stands for (Just A Rather Very Intelligent System) system used by Tony Stark in the Iron Man films.

India is home to the world's largest population of blind people and not nearly enough optometrists to provide the care the country needs. But recently, some doctors there have been receiving help in the fight against eye disease from an unexpected source. As Mashable reports, machine learning is being used to better understand the spread of blindness and predict the success rates of eye surgeries. The initiative is part of a collaboration between Microsoft and the Indian not-for-profit LV Prasad Eye Institute (LVPEI). At the center of the project are their Azure machine learning and Power BI services: After analyzing the anonymous records of 1.1 million people, the AI system can trace patterns of eye disease.

A wave of start-ups is emerging in famously risk-averse Japan as cash-rich corporations increasingly delegate the task of keeping pace with technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotics to smaller, nimbler businesses. Japan has been dry ground for start-ups, given the shame that entrepreneurs and investors associate with failure, but it is on track for a record funding year for unlisted start-ups, exceeding the dot-com bubble of 2000, according to a private research firm. "The fundraising environment has improved a lot compared with a few years ago," said Ken Tamagawa, 40-year-old CEO of Soracom Inc, which helps companies set up platforms allowing devices to communicate with each other via the "Internet of Things". It raised 3 billion yen ($25.6 million) from Mitsui & Co and an investment fund in which Toyota Motor Corp has a stake. Dozens of companies, including electronics maker Omron Corp and real estate developer Mitsui Fudosan Co, have set up venture capital funds to seek returns or team up with smaller companies.

Stock photo company Shutterstock introduced reverse image search for desktop earlier this spring. This made it easy for users to search Shutterstock's website with an image, instead of using keywords. Shutterstock's data scientist Kevin Lester, who looks closely at the adoption of these new tools, was able to find out what patterns emerge from the data. In fact, Lester shared with IBTimes, that those who used reverse-image search for searches wound up making more downloads per search than those from a user with a text-based search. "We've found that users who performed at least one reverse image search prior to making a purchase with Shutterstock were 3.49 times more likely to make a subsequent purchase than those who did not," says Lester.

Bizarre robot'lips' let you kiss long-distance lovers from anywhere in the world'Kissenger' device attaches to your phone and matches your partner's kiss Silicone lips move in real-time with theirs through six micro-sensors The high-tech mouthpieces even let you smell your partner from afar Developers plan to create full-sized snogging silicon heads in the future'Kissenger' device attaches to your phone and matches your partner's kiss A robot set of lips is promising to put the passion back into long-distance relationships. The Lovotics Kissenger is a silicone mouthpiece that allows you to smooch your partner from anywhere in the world. The bizarre device connects to your phone and will match a partner's lip movements and pressure in real-time. As well as feeling the kiss of a long-distance loved one, the device even lets you smell them. Scientists have created silicon robot lips that let you kiss someone from anywhere in the world.

The computer that can tell if you're pure or flirty just by your LOOKS! Artificial intelligence can predict a woman's personality, say researchers Researchers from Shanghai said they had developed a new AI programme It could tell if a woman has'positive' or'negative' traits based on her looks The team said they used images of 3,163 women to train the neural network They had also claimed their AI could tell if a person is a criminal by their looks It could tell if a woman has'positive' or'negative' traits based on her looks Chinese researchers claimed they had trained an AI computer to predict a woman's personality solely based on her looks (file photo) Shocking wedding footage shows bridesmaid being groped by... Hundreds of flights diverted, school cancelled and motorways... Controversy after a Chinese middle school introduces a new... Terrifying footage shows huge fire tearing through a... Shocking wedding footage shows bridesmaid being groped by... Hundreds of flights diverted, ...

Algorithms use ratings, rankings and recommendations to present us with items Before items can be ranked, they need a measure by which they can be ordered This is really a rating of each item's quality according to some criterion With ranked lists in hand, websites may turn around and make recommendations This is really a rating of each item's quality according to some criterion This holiday season, when we Google for the most trending gifts, compare different items on Amazon or take a break to watch a holiday movie on Netflix, we are making use of what might be called'the three R's' of the Internet Age: rating, ranking and recommending Apple's new AirPods are tough to recycle: Breakdown reveals... How to win like Andy Murray: Adversity and hardship could be... Does hurting a girlfriend's CAT make you more immoral than... The root of human kindness is NOT in our ancestors:... Apple's new AirPods are tough to recycle: Breakdown reveals... How to win like Andy Murray: Adversity and hardship could be... Does hurting a girlfriend's CAT make you more immoral than... The root of human kindness is NOT in our ancestors:... Websites' algorithms use the'new 3 Rs' to combine, process and synthesize information before presenting it to us. AMAZON'S ALGORITHM DOESN'T ALWAYS GIVE THE BETTER PRICE Before items can be ranked, they need a measure by which they can be ordered This is really a rating of each item's quality according to some criterion With ranked lists in hand, websites may turn around and make recommendations Amazon has mechanisms in place to screen out these sorts of reviews – for example, by requiring a purchase to have been made from a given account before it can submit a review. The prime example of recommendation systems is Netflix's method.