Recently, bots have been making the headlines as the new apps: conversation will play an important role in the next interface between humans and machines. Recast.AI is a collaborative platform allowing developers to create and deploy conversational agents on any channel. In this talk, Paul will approach four major problematics he faced while developing Recast's bot framework: modeling a conversation, understanding natural language, finding and extracting keywords, and generating language. His presentation will tackle the entire process of bot creation, from it's global implications to its core technicalities.

In warehouses, hospitals and retail stores, and on city streets, industrial parks and the footpaths of college campuses, the first representatives of this new invading force are starting to become apparent. "The robots are among us," says Steve Jurvetson, a Silicon Valley investor and a director at Elon Musk's Tesla and SpaceX companies, which have relied heavily on robotics. A multitude of machines will follow, he says: "A lot of people are going to come in contact with robots in the next two to five years." The arrival of the robots -- and their potentially devastating effect on human employment -- has been widely predicted. Now, the machines are starting to roll or walk out of the labs.

A new app that uses a neural network combined with facial recognition software to help put names to faces in random photographs by scanning social network data is being used in Russia to identify and harass young women who have previously appeared in pornographic films. Trinity Digital, an app developer in Russia, released a free iOS and Android app called FindFace in February that enables people to identify people by taking a random photograph and using its neural network to figure out the person's name, location, occupation and other details. A neural network is a huge network of computers that are trained using computer algorithms to solve complex problems quickly, as well as improving artificial intelligence by gaining a deeper recognition and understanding of art and the world around us. On 9 April, members of a disreputable imageboard called Dvach, which is like the Russian cousin of 4chan, launched a campaign to deliberately try to locate and identify actresses who appear in pornography, as well as women listed on Intimcity, a Russian website advertising prostitution and escort services. Using FindFace, the Dvach users not only identified the women, but they also shared archived copies of their profiles on Vkontakte (the Russian version of Facebook) publicly online and repeatedly spammed the families of the women letting them know that they had been outed as porn stars and prostitutes.

China's state-run media has accused internet giant Baidu of putting profits before people following the death of a 21-year-old student who used its search engine to seek out ineffective treatment for cancer. Wei Zexi, from Shaanxi province, died on 12 April after undergoing expensive experimental treatment that he had learned about through the search engine of Baidu, China's answer to Google. On Monday, amid growing public anger, the Communist party's official mouthpiece, the People's Daily, attacked Baidu for allegedly promoting potentially dubious medical treatments in its search results in exchange for money. "There have been hospitals making profits at the cost of killing patients who were directed by false advertisements paid at a higher rank in search results," the newspaper claimed, adding: "With great power comes great responsibility... profit considerations shall not be placed over social responsibility." According to reports in the Chinese media, Wei died of synovial sarcoma, a rare form of soft tissue cancer that can affect a person's legs, arms or torso.

In the digital world, business revolves around the customer. Organizations are transforming from the traditional business model to a customer-centric and personalized offering model. Customer experience has become the priority for businesses -- the key to differentiating themselves from their competitors. By improving the journey across the stages of customer engagement, they can create more personalized offerings and ultimately drive higher conversions. According to Gartner, in the next three years, 60 percent of digital commerce analytics investments will be spent on customer journey analytics.

"You'll have learning machines that sense we're under attack," Work stated on Monday. "We already have it in the Aegis combat system. Work assured the conference that the US government would never allow Artificial Intelligence to have the power to fire nuclear missiles in any offensive capacity. "Machines [are] taking over from humans key decisions of when to launch both offensive and defensive missiles… In the next decade it's going to become clear when and where we will delegate authority to machines. We will delegate [some] authority to machines," Work explained.

If you were picturing a not-so-distant future populated by ever-helpful artificial intelligence eager to kowtow to your every whim in a split second--well, think again. "I need another day," said the AI developed within algorithm editor Grasshopper to create a dress for the New York socialite Lisa Maria Falcone to wear to tonight's Met Gala. Designer Zaldy Goco, Robert de Saint Phalle of Conduit Projects (an interdisciplinary design and consulting studio), and computational designers Nicholas Jacobson and Jared Friedman all looked on in dismay. But much like the other minds behind the red carpet confections on display tonight, AI does not like to be pushed. To use logic, computation, generative algorithms, and mathematical optimization--or, simply, its artificially intelligent brain--to solve for the meticulous coding and arrangement of thousands of mirrors in 24 sizes and four colorways atop a flat grid of patterned pieces.

Arjun Pratap is founder and Chief Executive Officer at EdGE Networks. Fueled by the vision to build innovative, future-focused HR technology solutions – which re-engineer Human Resource Management to positively impact business outcomes – Arjun leads EdGE Networks to be a disruptor in the skill development space. Prior to EdGE Networks, Arjun worked with organizations such as SpeedERA Networks and Akamai Technologies, where he was responsible for building their India and international businesses. He also headed the sales function at Dexler Information Solutions to provide strategic direction in building the company. Arjun holds a post graduate degree in Information Systems and International Business, from The University of Sydney, Australia.

Machine learning is the science of getting computers to act without being explicitly programmed. In the past decade, machine learning has given us self-driving cars, practical speech recognition, effective web search, and a vastly improved understanding of the human genome. It will play a big part in the IoT. From our friends at R2D3 is a very interesting visual introduction to machine learning.

Historically, support centers, sales teams and marketing groups existed in three different silos. Machine learning makes it possible for organizations to make strides in sales, support and marketing efforts--at the same time. The ability to have real-time influence between the sales, marketing and support processes is an obvious precursor to additional profit. Because machine learning works from up-to-the-minute, granular information regarding customer actions and interactions, sales teams will always have real-time information on which customers are most satisfied.