As the world enters the age of the fourth industrial revolution, marked by accelerating innovation and the adoption of automation, the future of work is a fundamental question for the Middle East. While some jobs will be lost and others will be created, nearly all jobs will be transformed. The new reality is one in which 45 per cent of jobs will be automatable by 2030. The automation potential will vary across sectors: jobs requiring repetitive routine work such as manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will see more than 50 per cent of its work done by smart devices. Jobs that require emotional intelligence and creativity such as the arts, health care and entertainment will only see a 29 to 37 per cent automation rate.

Autonomous cars have been recently hitting the headlines and dominating tech-talks. It's being seen as a post-Uber disruption to public commute and transportation of goods. It's surely not a figment of the imagination in the age of artificial intelligence (AI) which is being used to complement driverless cars. The combined might of AI and driverless technologies is a formidable force to reckon. The likes of Waymo, Tesla, etc. are heavily invested in driverless cars.

On the heels of several new acquisitions and product announcements in recent months, Motorola Solutions is announcing a new radio equipped with a voice assistant, which the company says is the first of its kind. The public safety radio is called APX NEXT, building upon the company's prior APX two-way radios, and the virtual assistant that controls it has been dubbed ViQi (pronounced "Vicky"). The company's news release on Thursday said the radio is FirstNet-ready, built with LTE connectivity, and is the first APX radio to feature a touchscreen, designed for field use including with rain or gloves. Motorola Solutions Chief Technology Officer Mahesh Saptharishi said that besides being able to control the radio, the virtual assistant responds to commands like "ViQi, run a license plate," and can also look up driver's license information and vehicle identification numbers. He said other functions will come with future updates.

Augmedix, a startup that uses natural language processing (NLP) and devices to populate medical documentation from clinician-patient conversations, has raised $19 million in Series B funding. Redmile Group, McKesson Ventures, DCM Ventures, Wanxiang Healthcare Investments and other unnamed investors all contributed. Founded in 2012, the startup made a name for itself by outfitting doctors with Google Glass devices. Through these, professional medical scribes could remotely observe the visit and, with the help of NLP, fill out the patient's necessary documentation. This approach allows the clinician to remained focused on engaging their patient, only needing to sign off on or make minor adjustments to the documentation at the end of the visit.

Several recent investments and Pentagon initiatives show that military leaders are concerned about keeping up with – and ahead of – China and Russia, two countries that have made big gains in developing artificial-intelligence systems. AI-powered weapons include target recognition systems, weapons guided by AI, and cyberattack and cyberdefense software that runs without human intervention. The U.S. defense community is coming to understand that AI will significantly transform, if not completely reinvent, the world's military power balance. The concern is more than military. As Chinese and Russian technologies become more sophisticated, they threaten U.S. domination of technological innovation and development, as well as global economic power and influence.

The service is accessible on the IACAD website by clicking on the "Chat with us" icon at the bottom right corner of the homepage. Once the user selects the preferred language, a message pops up: "Hello, Welcome to the virtual assistant of the Department of Islamic Affairs and Charitable Activities in Dubai, you can ask your question about one of the following topics: Prayer, Zakat, Purity, Worship."

Acute intracranial hemorrhage (ICH), sometimes referred to as a "brain bleed," shares symptoms with several other neurological conditions. Today, emergency departments rely on CT scans to detect this life-threatening condition--and even the most experienced radiologists can sometimes miss the subtle signs of the condition on such lower resolution images. Now, researchers from the University of California, San Francisco and the University of California, Berkeley have demonstrated that a deep learning artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm can provide "expert-level" detection of brain hemorrhage in a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences--not only performing at the same standard as expert radiologists but finding tiny brain bleeds that those experts overlooked. The researchers used a single-stage, end-to-end, fully convolutional deep learning neural network in order to help identify what are usually very small abnormalities that must been detected on an image known for poor soft tissue contrast and low signal-to-noise issues. They trained the algorithm on a data set of over 4,000 CT exams where ICH abnormalities were manually highlighted at the pixel level.

Technological advancements can enhance human development and contribute to creating optimal conditions for the exercise of human rights. At the same time, we need to address questions of fairness, of the risk of perpetuating bias and stereotypes, of discriminatory decision-making patterns, and of challenges related to interpretability, privacy, security and oversight. And we should ask ourselves: what can countries and international organisations do to address the challenge of "algocracy"? The discussion Artificial Intelligence – Technology to Serve Humankind will engage the audience in critical reflection on the challenges and opportunities that AI carries for individuals and societies, and for the viability of institutional frameworks, with a special emphasis on the use of the technology for public policies that enhance the quality of life and progress of humankind. The event will address the legal and ethical questions that accompany the current and potential use of AI in our society and identify potential ways forward.

In the battle of the buds, our "taste test" was striking. A friend and I both compared listening to the Foo Fighters "Learn to Fly" on Amazon's new Echo Buds and the product it aims to emulate, what Apple calls the best-selling headphone "in the world," the AirPods. The Amazon product "sounded tinnier," said Jan Schreiber, a Laguna Beach, California-based photographer. The AirPods had richer bass and a fuller sound. We switched to other songs, and the verdict didn't change.

Tinder, the most popular dating app in the world, has banned teens under the age of 18 but it's not stopping them from signing up. A jilted Australian doctor pleaded guilty Monday to sending 9,000 abusive and threatening messages to her former Tinder date, according to a new report. Radiologist Denise Jane Lee, 40, of Sydney, copped to four of 10 charges against her ahead of a scheduled five-day hearing in the Downing Centre Local Court, the Australian Associated Press reported. Lee, who was arrested in February 2017, copped to three counts of using a carriage service to harass, menace or offend and one count of intimidation, according to the report. Six additional charges were withdrawn.