Acer had a lot to share at its annual global press conference in New York today. In addition to a slew of gaming laptops and monitors, it showed off a new line of pro-grade computers. Called ConceptD, the new series is the result of a collaboration with IF Design agency and targets creators who want machines that look as good as the work they produce. ConceptD revolves around four pillars -- performance, silence, design and precision -- which is about delivering accurate colors on monitors. And the devices that Acer unveiled certainly seem to deliver on those fronts.

Amazon has admitted that employees listen to customer voice recordings from Echo and other Alexa-enabled smart speakers. The online retail giant said its staff "reviewed" a sample of Alexa voice assistant conversations in order to improve speech recognition. "This information helps us train our speech recognition and natural language understanding systems, so Alexa can better understand your requests, and ensure the service works well for everyone," Amazon said in a statement. We'll tell you what's true. You can form your own view.

Scientist Katherine Bouman has become one of the world's most popular people for helping create the first ever picture of a black hole. The researcher was one of a team made up of a huge number of experts who produced the image, which shows the blazing red and yellow of the event horizon that surrounds the first black hole ever to be seen. And one image in particular of Dr Bouman doing part of that work – using an algorithm she wrote to generate the image that made headlines around the world – has served as a reminder of the vast amount of expertise that has gone into creating such an achievement. We'll tell you what's true. You can form your own view.

PlayStation players can finally change their PSN names, in a change set to delight everyone suffering with names they're ashamed of. But it comes with two major catches: the name can only be changed for free once, and switching it up might cause problems for some games. Many people are still left with names they set years ago, which can often become embarrassing with time. As such, it has become one of the PlayStation's most requested features and people have become more and more frustrated with time. We'll tell you what's true. You can form your own view.

Space is doing some strange things to astronauts' bodies, a new study has found. The Nasa twins study is looking at two twins – Scott and Mark Kelly – in an attempt to understand the affects of spaceflight on people's health and physiology. By having one remain on Earth while another lived on the International Space Station for more than a year, researchers are able to compare the two in an attempt to understand what difference to the trip into space made. Now early results show a host of unusual changes happened to Scott when he headed into space. That included the discovery that in some ways, a person's health is not greatly affected at all by a trip into space.

Tens of millions of people use smart speakers and their voice software to play games, find music or trawl for trivia. Millions more are reluctant to invite the devices and their powerful microphones into their homes out of concern that someone might be listening. Inc. employs thousands of people around the world to help improve the Alexa digital assistant powering its line of Echo speakers. The team listens to voice recordings captured in Echo owners' homes and offices. The recordings are transcribed, annotated and then fed back into the software as part of an effort to eliminate gaps in Alexa's understanding of human speech and help it better respond to commands.

Alphabet's subsidiary Wing announced this week that it has officially launched a commercial drone delivery service "to a limited set of eligible homes in the suburbs of Crace, Palmerston and Franklin," which are just north of Canberra, in Australia. Wing's drones are able to drop a variety of small products, including coffee, food, and pharmacy items, shuttling them from local stores to customers' backyards within minutes. We've been skeptical about whether this kind of drone delivery makes sense for a long, long time, and while this is certainly a major milestone for Wing, I'm still not totally convinced that the use-cases that Wing is pushing here are going to be sustainable long term. I've still got a bunch of questions about these things. For example, does the drone have any kind of in-flight sense and avoid?

Senior, PhD-level engineers with a background in artificial intelligence and machine learning may have more leverage than just about anyone on Wall Street. Investment banks are desperate for people with AI experience and are going to no end to bring them aboard, industry experience bedamned. J.P. Morgan recently poached AI specialists from Google, Facebook and two leading research universities in the U.S. Goldman Sachs hired away a machine learning guru from Amazon, while Morgan Stanley hired an AI and cloud engineering expert with the background in fashion. Needless to say, banks are surely sweetening offers to recruit expert AI minds away from tech giants and comfy university positions. That said, there aren't a massive number of AI jobs currently available on Wall Street as use of the technology is just ramping up.

One business who realized that using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning is a business need, no longer a competitive advantage is PepsiCo. The food-and-beverage company behind brands such as Pepsi, Gatorade, Tropicana, Lipton, Frito-Lay, and Quaker sells products in more than 200 countries and brought in $64.7 billion in annual revenue last year. From robots to machine learning, PepsiCo uses AI and machine learning throughout the organization in many ways. There's a six-wheeled mobile vending machine robot tooling around the University of the Pacific chockful of PepsiCo snacks and beverages from Hello Goodness--a healthier line-up that includes SunChips, Baked Lay's and bubly sparkling water. Named Snackbot, these self-driving robots are a partnership between Robby Technologies and PepsiCo.

SIDO, the groundbreaking event of the IoT industry, is bringing down the barriers between technologies and, for its 5th edition, announces a unique forum in Europe combining IoT, AI & Robotics! From enabling technologies to comprehensive solutions, SIDO drives innovation and brings together 3 converging ecosystems for projects that are connected, autonomous and increasingly smarter. Take part in this major "Technologies & Markets" event, to be held on 10 & 11 April 2019 at the Cité Internationale convention center in Lyon, France. " IoT: a market which holds its promise of a 10% growth per year thanks to the dynamism of the industrial markets, to reach an installed base of 35 billion units in 2030. The race for productivity will push them to smarter, more mobile robots.