Artificial intelligence and machine learning are becoming part of the economy in ways we could only imagine a decade ago. From self-driving cars to robots, the rapid growth of AI creates tremendous potential opportunities to increase productivity and economic growth. Panelists at the event discussed how computer scientists design and implement AI as well as how it is being incorporated into diverse fields and applications, including the current FCC spectrum auction, the digital humanities and image recognition. Discussion panel "Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning 101," from the event "Artificial Intelligence: The Economic and Policy Implications" hosted by the Technology Policy Institute Speakers: Colin Allen, Provost Professor of Cognitive Science and History & Philosophy of Science & Medicine, Indiana University and Chair Professor of Philosophy, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, China Kris Hammond, Chief Scientist and co-founder, Narrative Science and Professor of Computer Science, Northwestern University Jenn Wortman Vaughan, Senior Researcher, Microsoft Research, New York City Alex Tabarrok (moderator), Bartley J. Madden Chair in Economics and Professor of Economics, George Mason University

Could the armies of lawyers needed to close billion-dollar deals soon be a thing of the past? That's what Invoke Capital, the London-based venture firm run by former Autonomy Plc Chief Executive Officer Mike Lynch, is betting with its latest project financing. Invoke said Wednesday that it's making an investment in Luminance, a U.K. startup using artificial intelligence to process legal documents and automate due diligence in mergers and acquisitions. While the amount of the investment was not disclosed, Lynch said in an interview that the figure was "in the low millions." Luminance says its software can read and understand hundreds of pages of legal documents a minute, enabling lawyers to carry out due diligence far faster than previously.

Uber is is going to repay riders the tips that were charged to them when they used the transportation service after U.S. District Court Judge Edward Chen reportedly gave the green light to the deal that would compel the San Francisco-based company to do so. The Verge has learned that to settle the claim, Uber is repaying 47,000 customers with tips amounting to 384,000. For over a year, this shady business has earned Uber 860,000 from the gratuity charge. While this claim has been settled, Chen is to once again preside over another lawsuit by a class of drivers against Uber. The drivers are claiming that the company misclassified them as independent contractors.

Over the past century, we have made massive strides in the rights revolution. These include rights for women, children, the LGBT community, animals, and so much more. Exploring the future, we must ask ourselves: what next? Will we ever fight for the rights of artificial intelligence? If so, when will this AI rights revolution occur, and what will it look like? We talk about protecting ourselves from AI, but what about protecting AI from us? To create a desirable future where humans and conscious machines are at peace with one another, treating our AI with respect may be a crucial factor in preventing the apocalypse Elon Musk, Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates fear.

Pete Skomoroch and Jon Bruner will be hosting O'Reilly Bot Day October 19, 2016, in San Francisco. Subscribe to the O'Reilly Bots Podcast to learn about advances in conversational user interfaces, artificial intelligence, and messaging that are revolutionizing the way we interact with software. Find us on Stitcher, iTunes, SoundCloud and RSS. In episode five of the O'Reilly Bots podcast, Pete Skomoroch and I speak with Joshua Browder, the 19-year old founder and CEO of DoNotPay, a series of bots that help people with legal issues, including challenging parking tickets, challenging bank charges, and claiming government assistance for homelessness. Dubbed "the world's first robot lawyer," his bots have attracted 260,000 users and provided 175,000 successful parking-ticket appeals.

A deep growl came from the other side of Shaniqua Roland's front door. She was pregnant at the time and headed to a doctor's appointment, but she knew she couldn't leave the house. For half an hour, as she tried to shoo them away, a pack of pit bulls snarled and snapped at her metal door. She thought of her sister, who'd recently lost a chunk of her calf in a dog attack. She'd see her doctor another day.

Artificial intelligence (AI), robotics and automation are possibly the most fascinating topics for those dealing with technology (and sourcing) matters. They raise a lot of interesting questions and scenarios. Even the few official legal documents about these subjects refer to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Pygmalion, Prague's Golem – and the more obvious Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics (see the EU Parliament Draft Report with recommendations to the Commission on Civil Law Rules on Robotics). But this is not only about philosophy and futuristic settings. There is already no doubt that robots, androids and all other forms of artificial intelligence are already playing a fundamental role in the new Internet of Things (IoT) "smart" industrial revolution, which will affect most if not all industrial sectors and countries.

Tesla Motors is once again facing controversy over the safety of its Autopilot technology for assisting car drivers, this time in connection with the death of the driver in a Model S crash in China. The father of the deceased filed a lawsuit in a Beijing court in July against the car dealer who sold him the car, alleging that his son had turned on the Autopilot feature before he crashed into a vehicle in January in the northeastern province of Hebei, according to reports citing Chinese state broadcaster CCTV. Tesla has said it is unable to determine whether or not Autopilot was engaged at the time of the crash. As a result of the damage caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to Tesla servers, wrote spokeswoman Keely Sulprizio late Wednesday. "We have tried repeatedly to work with our customer to investigate the cause of the crash, but he has not provided us with any additional information that would allow us to do so," Sulprizio added in an email.

Is your firm prepared to welcome in an era of legal practice using artificial intelligence (AI)? Where is this technology headed and why must law firm leaders fully understand how cognitive computing works in order to benefit from it? With the vast amounts of structured and unstructured data firms have to deal with, there is increasing pressure from nimble technologies and clients to attract AI and cognitive technologies. Understanding the market implications of digital business information and trends is now key to attaining the best possible performance, revenue gains and cost savings. Berwin Leighton Paisner was one of the first firms to embrace AI in the UK, developing its'contract robot' which promised to complete work in seconds that would have otherwise taken a team of paralegals months to do.

A former Philippine militiaman testified before a Senate panel on Thursday that President Rodrigo Duterte, when he was mayor of a southern city, ordered him and other members of a liquidation squad to kill criminals and political opponents in gangland-style assaults that left about 1,000 dead. Edgar Matobato, 57, told the nationally televised Senate committee hearing that he heard Duterte order some of the killings and acknowledged that he himself carried out about 50 of the abductions and deadly assaults in Davao, including one in which they fed a man to a crocodile in 2007. The Senate committee inquiry was being led by Sen. Leila de Lima, a staunch critic of Duterte's antidrug campaign that is believed to have killed more than 3,000 suspected drug users and dealers since he assumed the presidency in June. Duterte has accused De Lima of involvement in illegal drugs, alleging that she used to have a driver who took money from detained drug lords. She has denied the allegations.