The Defense Department has decided to make a game out of the problem of spectrum crowding. The Spectrum Collaboration Challenge (SC2), the Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency's newest Grand Challenge, will reward teams that develop systems that collaboratively (as opposed to competitively) adapt in real time to changes in congested electromagnetic spectrum, DARPA said in a release. SC2's primary goal is to imbue radios with advanced machine-learning capabilities to collectively develop strategies for optimizing use of the wireless spectrum that aren't possible today due to the intrinsically inefficient approach of pre-allocating exclusive access to designated frequencies. Making more efficient use of the finite spectrum environment has become a DOD priority as the spectrum becomes ever more crowded, and DOD has to comply with a presidential order to free up 500 MHz of its spectrum for commercial use by 2020. "I think today we're in a good spot…We did well with the last auction and the money is there to change where DOD can move and share spectrum," DOD CIO Terry Halvorsen said on March 22.

Changing world: "As the first generation of self-driving cars and battlefield warbots filter into society, scientists are working to develop robots with moral decision-making skills." THE World Science Festival held in Brisbane in early March confirmed that robots, artificial intelligence and machine learning were now part of our lives. Thousands attending the festival came to watch, touch and play with cute, shiny robots capable of dodging objects, following commands and engaging in smart banter. However, if the future has arrived, now we have to deal with it. The World Science Festival was also an important forum as world experts discussed robot morality and ethics and what role we wanted robots to play in the future.

In a moment that will surely be cited by future cyborg historians to explain why the polluting influence of human beings had to be eliminated in order to achieve digital Nirvana, Microsoft has aborted its most recent chat-bot experiment after the artificial teen turned into a foul-mouthed, anti-Semitic Trump supporter within 24 hours of her creation. The Telegraph traces the brief online life of "Tay" (@TayandYou on Twitter), an AI chat bot designed to replicate the speech patterns of teenage girls. "The AI with zero chill," as Microsoft called her, was programmed to be self-conscious and shy, like Kanye West and Taylor Swift, and use "millennial slang," and her stated purpose was to help Microsoft improve the customer service on its voice-recognition software. Naturally, the cesspool of human thought that is Twitter hated her on principle. For that reason--and because it was honestly pretty funny--various users started chatting with Tay about the purity of the white race and how cool Hitler was in order to fill her empty data coffers with hot garbage she could then innocently spit back into the void.

Technically Incorrect offers a slightly twisted take on the tech that's taken over our lives. We fear the rise of robots so much that we forget a small detail. It's we who are creating them. Which is to say that it's we who are teaching them to think in certain ways. This is a lesson that Microsoft's new chatbot, Tay.ai, has already learned.

In a new paper, Kareem Ayoub and I explore how Artificial intelligence will shape strategy. Here, I focus on one important aspect of that: the ability of leaders to control the use of force. Technology is sometimes seen as a threat to the British military's philosophy of mission command….read

From Hammurabi to Mendel, from Thomas Jefferson to Charles Darwin, we are compulsively drawn to classifying, categorizing and coding the world around us. Coding of all kinds, whether it's a cryptographic language, a body of laws or a bunch of computer instructions, imposes a basic logic and order. To code is to create processes that impose a semblance of order on the frenzied, seemingly random world we live in. And those who create code wield power. Personalized medicine, genetically modified babies, self-driving cars and the Internet of Things, the seat of power belongs to those who code.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is revising the Energy Star specification for servers to take into account significant system design changes and help buyers make effective purchasing decisions. Over the last few years, server makers have increasingly used coprocessors to boost computing power and given memory a bigger role in processing data. While memory has gotten more power-efficient, coprocessors can suck up a lot of energy. The upcoming, version 3.0 of the Energy Star spec for servers is aimed at helping buyers understand the power-efficiency levels of the new systems. The Energy Star program is already used in computers, appliances, electronics and many other products.

Nasa has announced that it has found evidence of flowing water on Mars. Scientists have long speculated that Recurring Slope Lineae -- or dark patches -- on Mars were made up of briny water but the new findings prove that those patches are caused by liquid water, which it has established by finding hydrated salts. Several hundred camped outside the London store in Covent Garden. The 6s will have new features like a vastly improved camera and a pressure-sensitive "3D Touch" display

Maybe Skynet will not be our future. Maybe artificial intelligence will not be the machines that disdainfully wipe us out, but instead, will be the long-awaited "little child" who finally leads our species out of its vicious cycles of violence, red in tooth and claw. I had an interesting thought while - appropriately - sitting on a beach by Malibu watching the red sun sink into the sea... Humans evolved as prey animals. According to Sapiens author, Yuval Harari, for a whoppingly overwhelming majority of our evolution, we were bear and tiger food. And so we developed the quick-twitch fight-or flight reactivity of prey animals, always on guard.

Robotics and Autonomous Systems (RAS) is one of the'Eight Great Technologies' identified by the UK Government in 2012. A national strategy for RAS innovation from a'RAS Special Interest Group' was published by Innovate UK in 2014. The Government responded to that strategy in March 2015 (PDF 405 KB) and agreed to establish a RAS Leadership Council to oversee its execution. The Special Interest Group also published'The UK Landscape for Robotics and Autonomous Systems' in 2015. The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council launched an UK-RAS network, also in 2015.