The robotic skull of a T-600 cyborg used in the movie Terminator 3. Eduardo Parra/Getty Images hide caption The robotic skull of a T-600 cyborg used in the movie Terminator 3. In his lab at George Mason University in Virginia, Sean Luke has all kinds of robots: big ones with wheels, medium ones that look like humans, and then he has a couple of dozen that look like small, metal boxes. He and his team at the Autonomous Robotics Lab are training those little ones to work together without the help of a human. In the future, Luke and his team hope those little robots can work like ants -- in teams of hundreds, for example, to build houses, or help search for survivors after a disaster. "These things are changing very rapidly and they're changing much faster than we sort of expected them to be changing recently," Luke says. New algorithms and huge new databases are allowing robots to navigate complex spaces, and artificial intelligence just achieved a victory few thought would ever happen: A computer made by Google beat a professional human in a match of Go.

Without fail, every few months there is yet another breathlessly published blog post or article proclaiming that "SEO is Dead!" Typically this dire proclamation regarding the future of SEO is accompanied by some variation of the following: In reality, SEO will never die. At least not as long as there are search engines. While Google certainly has diminished the amount of real estate for the average search query in the "traditional" organic search result, "natural" search results are critically important for search engines. If, as some have speculated, Google went to a "paid" results-only model, over time I suspect that the average web user would lose trust in the quality of their search results. However, there are by contrast many exciting developments in the field or search that will likely have a huge impact on SEO in the coming years.

Facebook already has research groups dedicated to advancing the company's capabilities in artificial intelligence, machine learning, computer vision and natural language processing and speech. Earlier this month, for example, it introduced an iOS feature called "automatic alternative text" that uses object recognition technology to provide spoken descriptions of Facebook photos to people who are visually impaired. And this month, the company also unveiled new bot and chatbot technology as part of its Messenger Platform, now in beta. The bots enable businesses using the platform to provide automated information and help to online customers. "A lot of what we're building today in areas like connectivity, artificial intelligence and virtual and augmented reality may not pay off for years," Zuckerberg said at the start of yesterday's call.

With the rapid rise of artificial intelligence, cognitive computing and machine learning, insurance carriers have the opportunity to join the travel and retail industry, and leading technology players such as Google, IBM and Microsoft who are already taking advantage of these smart technologies. This form of "conversational intelligence" or "thinking machine" technology learns from every human interaction to be predictive towards a users questions or proactive with a suggestion. One of the barriers carriers face is with the Data. "Collecting it, storing it, normalizing it, tracing its lineage and the critical – if not particularly sexy – matter of governance" The key is then harnessing modern software and technologies to translate these insights into action. "There's little arguing that the degree of complexity around big data in healthcare is exactly why clinicians, physicians and, indeed, the industry at large need these emerging technologies, which have felt so far away for so long."

A new USB stick computer uses Google's machine-learning software to give drones and robots the equivalent of a human eye, and add new smarts to cameras. It is instead designed to analyze pixels and provide the right context for images. Fathom provides the much-needed horsepower for devices like drones, robots and cameras to run computer vision applications like image recognition. These devices alone typically don't have the ability to run computer vision applications. Fathom uses an embedded version of Google's TensorFlow machine learning software for vision processing.

How does the image-recognition technology in a self-driving car respond to a blurred shape suddenly appearing on the road? Researchers from KU Leuven, Belgium, have shown that machines can learn to respond to unfamiliar objects like human beings would. Imagine heading home in your self-driving car. The rain is falling in torrents and visibility is poor. All of a sudden, a blurred shape appears on the road.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Google CEO Sundar Pichai says the next big evolution for technology is artificial intelligence. "Looking to the future, the next big step will be for the very concept of the'device' to fade away," Pichai wrote in the technology giant's annual founders' letter to shareholders. His vision: Over time, computers, whatever shape they take, a mobile device in your hand or a mini computer on your wrist, "will be an intelligent assistant helping you through your day." Google is far from alone. Artificial intelligence in which Google was a pioneer, is an increasingly crowded field.

Microsoft is the world's most valuable company, with a 261 billion market cap. And an IBM computer named Deep Blue defeats Garry Kasparov, reigning world chess champion and, at the time, the highest-ranked chess player to have ever lived. Though it was not the first time man has lost to machine, it is perhaps the most prominent, highly publicized by IBM and widely covered by the global media. It was viewed as a milestone for AI, the true arrival of computer intelligence. The world celebrated the achievement of technology -- or offered doomsday predictions of a robot revolution.

AI technologies such as machine learning will play a key role in shaping the future, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said in the company's annual Founders' Letter to stockholders on Thursday. "It's what has allowed us to build products that get better over time, making them increasingly useful and helpful," wrote Pichai, who cited examples such as voice search, translation tools, image recognition and spam filters. The recent victory of DeepMind's AlphaGo software over legendary master Lee Sedol at the ancient game of Go is "game-changing," Pichai added. Far from portending humanity's downfall, however, the victory is ultimately one for the human race, he said. "This is another important step toward creating artificial intelligence that can help us in everything from accomplishing our daily tasks and travels to eventually tackling even bigger challenges like climate change and cancer diagnosis," Pichai said.

A computer scientist who helped bring Apple's Siri to the world has invented a method for unlocking an iPhone by talking to it. The technology, revealed in an Apple patent application, would eliminate the need for a separate security step and allow users to be identified by voice at the same time they're telling the device to perform a task. "There are few security measures I can think of that aren't an additional step," said Bryant Walker Smith, an affiliate scholar at Stanford University's Center for Internet and Society. "Conceivably, you might unlock simply by saying, 'Apple, give me directions to Redmond, Washington,' and there would be no additional steps. Cutting away that one step makes it that much easier to interact with your device as a conversational partner or assistant, where you just ask a question rather than unlock and ask it a question."