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In a video message to the summit, Mr. Guterres called AI "a new frontier" with "advances moving at warp speed." The opening session of the summit is expected to give voice to the leading minds in AI, with breakout sessions focusing on issues such as sustainable living and poverty reduction. ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao, said the event "will assist us in determining how the UN, ITU and other UN agencies can work together with industry and the academic community to promote AI innovation and create a good environment for the development of artificial intelligence." The summit will run through Friday, with a closing session on "applying AI for good."
Artificial Intelligence Startup Wyzerr Launches Platform to Create Surveys That Feel Like Games
Artificial intelligence start-up Wyzerr announced today the launch of an online platform to create feedback surveys that feel like games. The surveys, which the company calls "Smart Forms," can capture up to 25 questions in under 60 seconds. Wyzerr's Smart Forms were developed based on playful design principals and rules of engagement. Wyzerr spent the past 2 years piloting their gammified surveys with large enterprises like Walmart, Unilever, and Volkswagen. The key learnings from those pilots served as the inspiration for the company's new online Smart Form builder, which guides customers in creating effective feedback campaigns.
AI learns to draw human faces from sketches with nightmarish results
The terrifying faces may look like creatures from a horror movie, but these digital images were actually generated by artificial intelligence (AI). Pix2pix project has unleashed a new tool that analyzes portraits and fills them in with colors and textures using a technique called generative adversarial networks (GANs). During the process, the system determines if its result match the sketch and will keep repeating the generation process until its own passes as'real' – regardless of how nightmarish the results may look. The terrifying faces may look like creatures from a horror movie, but these digital images were actually generated by artificial intelligence (AI). Users are presented with an input box and an output box and are prompted to draw a face in input, select process and in seconds, the AI will reveal its version of the sketch.
VR, video games and music will power entertainment and media growth through 2021, PwC report says
The U.S. entertainment and media business is expected to see modest-to-slow growth over the next five years, according to a new report from PricewaterhouseCoopers. The report singles out traditional sectors such as cinema and television as areas of sluggishness, while pointing to emerging industries including e-sports and virtual reality as sectors poised for the most growth. Total domestic revenue for all media and entertainment industries is expected to rise less than 4% annually over the next five years, reaching $759 billion in 2021. The forecast data comes as media companies are scrambling to find innovative ways to reach consumers in a rapidly changing environment. "[Entertainment and media] companies are operating amidst a wave of geopolitical turbulence, regulatory changes and technological disruption," Mark McCaffrey, PwC's leader for U.S. technology, media, and telecommunications, said in a statement.
At WWDC 2017 Apple Announces MusicKit API, Core ML API, ARKit API
Just yesterday, over 5000 developers gathered at the San Jose Convention Center for Apple's WWDC 2017. In addition to the usual hardware overhauls and new products, Apple also announced some new APIs. The MusicKit API allows developers to extend the functionality of Apple Music to third-party applications. The API makes it possible for applications to tap into a user's Apple Music account (once they authorize the application of course) and create playlists, add songs to their library, and play any of the content in the Apple Music catalog. If a user is not already signed up for Apple Music, the company makes note that they can be offered a trial membership. You had to know that was coming.
Artificial General Intelligence : Too Much or Too Little Too Soon?
When it comes to Artificial Intelligence (AI), people's responses vary: from "Terminator and Skynet are coming to kill us all" to "Will the bots take my jobs?" to "Awesome, now I can sit back and do the fun stuff while the bots take care of tedious tasks for me." But there are also misperceptions and misinformation. It's always useful to have a basic grasp of AI, because whether you like it or not, AI is already manifesting in many aspects of our lives. For instance, you can now order Domino's pizzas by talking to your phone. Plus, the pizza giant also says it is moving from a "mobile first" to an "AI first" philosophy.
Ethics may be the next challenge for artificial intelligence engineers
In shows like HBO's "Westworld" and AMC's "Humans," Hollywood pits robots, with artificial intelligence, against humans. Half a century ago, a science fiction film about a space mission planted the first seeds of doubt about just how the human race could coexist with man-made sentient beings. "Consider the fictional robot HAL in '2001: A Space Odyssey,' " said Ken Ford, a computer scientist and founder and CEO of the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, in Pensacola, which has won awards for its robotics innovations. HAL eventually turned on its master in that classic film, sending shivers down the spines of moviegoers everywhere. Some of that wariness about artificial intelligence still exists, but Ford said the fear is unwarranted, and in the case of fictional robots, misplaced.
Amazon exec: Alexa should be able to talk to Siri
NEW YORK-- Alexa and Siri, rival voice assistants on Amazon's Echo and Apple's iPhone, don't directly communicate with one another. But the Amazon executive in charge of Alexa and the Amazon Echo said he'd welcome the idea. "You should be able to tell Alexa, ask Siri X,'" said David Limp, senior vice president of devices at Amazon. "If Apple or Google want to come calling, my phone number is out there, they can call...I don't know if I can envision it but I hope that will happen on behalf of customers," Limp told a group of journalists at the Wired Business Conference Wednesday in New York. Limp has a strong interest in Apple's entry into the voice-activated, artificially-intelligent infused speaker space, which also includes Google Home and Microsoft's Cortana on the Harmon Kardon Invoke speaker.
Apple HomePod, Amazon Echo And How Streaming Music May Be The Key Difference
This article originally appeared on the Motley Fool. Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) has officially stepped into the market for stationary speakers powered by virtual assistants, a product category that Amazon.com Amazon's Echo family continues to expand, recently adding the Echo Look and Echo Show. Apple has never put all that much weight into being the first to market provided it can be the best when it finally gets there. With that in mind, how does the new HomePod stack up against the dominant Echo?