Inching down the freeway, a driver realizes she's forgotten her weekend plans and asks her digital copilot to check her calendar. Within seconds, a voice emanates from the car's speakers telling the driver that she has RSVP'd to a friend's birthday party and then suggesting a gift--a Detroit Lions jersey. The entire process ends less than two minutes after the driver asks the digital assistant to order the jersey. Meanwhile, the dialogue inside the car is sent to a distant data center, ready to be mined for ads pitching an NFL game, even though the driver dislikes football. Once clunky and buggy, voice-recognition technology is improving and quickly spreading to the dashboard, allowing drivers to issue a wider range of commands using natural speech.

Apple's new AirPods might have been accidentally confirmed – but its own iPhone update. The latest beta version of the iOS software appears to not only suggest that new versions of the wireless earphones are coming soon, but also what one of their main features might be. The leak comes from a hidden part of the iOS 12.2 update which is currently available for developers. Inside a pop-up that is not visible without digging around is a suggestion about how those nearphones might work. While a user is setting up the option to speak to the phone's digital assistant just by saying "Hey, Siri", the message suggests that people will be able to do so just by speaking into their AirPods, rather than into their phone.

Woolworths is working on a "green field" conversational AI platform that it expects to run "at enterprise scale" in its operations. The project forms part of what the supermarket giant says is "a roadmap of solutions powered by leading edge AI and ML" - artificial intelligence and machine learning - that will be used to create "future shopping" experiences. It is being run under the auspices of Woolworths combined loyalty and digital arm, WooliesX. The project came to light in a recent recruitment advertisement for a technology lead for conversational AI. It appears the role could have input into some of the other virtual assistant and voice-enabled experiences that Woolworths has already built.

There is a demand-supply mismatch of jobs in cutting-edge IT fields such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. Two trends are indicative of the fact. First is via industry predictions -- these estimate the growth in the AI market from $21.46 billion to $190.61 billion between 2018 and 2025. Year on year growth is projected to be an impressive 36.62 per cent during the same period. The second trend is that major Indian IT firms in the US are reportedly'hoarding' employees in these two fields as they foresee a shortage in skilled experts.

Since 1975, Woodhouse Clothing has been paving the way for modern menswear. Now a premium online retailer, its unique portfolio of over 50 brands includes BOSS, Armani and CP Company, alongside new and niche brands, such as McQ, Albam and Woolrich. Forty years on, Woodhouse still embodies its original values, housing only the best brands on the global market, with the aim of bringing that personal touch back to the world of retail. Nosto is the fastest growing ecommerce personalisation and retail AI platform in the world. Supporting more than 2,500 retail brands in more than 100 countries, Nosto has fuelled over 25 billion personalised experiences and delivered a gross merchandise volume (GMV) of more than $10 billion through its customer stores. Nosto's end-to-end personalisation platform provides deep customer insights that drive real-time personalized shopping experiences across any touch point and any device. Through its patented technology, proprietary machine learning algorithms, vast network of ecommerce data and dedicated customer success team, Nosto supports its retailers from its offices in New York, Los Angeles, London, Berlin, Paris, Stockholm and Helsinki. More information can be found at https://www.nosto.com/.

The beta version of iOS 12.2 comes with a pretty strong indication that you'll be able to use Apple's next-gen AirPods to summon Siri. While the earbuds you can buy right now don't support the feature, rumors suggest that Apple is developing a new version that can. The setup screen, as you'd expect, will give you a way to configure a new pair of earbuds to respond to your voice. According to 9to5Mac, the new AirPods themselves will be able to recognize the "Hey Siri" command, allowing you to summon the voice assistant even if your phone is in your pocket or your bag and without having to tap on the earbuds. Apple hasn't announced anything definite about the second version of its wireless earbuds yet.

Most technology news as of late somehow relates back to artificial intelligence. The seemingly complex and high-brow technology is integrated into mundane items, such as Amazon's Alexa or Google Home. With talk of artificial intelligence comes machine learning and deep machine learning. The three phrases can often be conflated, but do refer to three specific technologies.

The past year has shown the power of artificial intelligence (AI) around the world. Globally, businesses and governments saw 2018 as the breakout year for AI, with venture capitalists pushing 47% more investment in 2018 into AI businesses in the UK alone. The increased use of AI had a seismic impact on consumers' daily lives in ways many do not even realise – take, for example, daily Spotify and Netflix recommendations. With many real-world applications beginning to use this technology in 2018, it may finally be the case that 2019 is the year that AI goes beyond the hype. Society's readiness to embrace these changes has allowed for advancement in this technology as the real-world benefits are finally being realised.

Machine-learning algorithms use statistics to find patterns in massive* amounts of data. And data, here, encompasses a lot of things--numbers, words, images, clicks, what have you. If it can be digitally stored, it can be fed into a machine-learning algorithm. Machine learning is the process that powers many of the services we use today--recommendation systems like those on Netflix, YouTube, and Spotify; search engines like Google and Baidu; social-media feeds like Facebook and Twitter; voice assistants like Siri and Alexa.

Thursday's top Amazon deals are on things you'll love. If you make a purchase by clicking one of our links, we may earn a small share of the revenue. However, our picks and opinions are independent from USA Today's newsroom and any business incentives. When everyone else is checking their email, reading the news, or scrolling through Facebook as they start their day, I'm over here poring over Amazon's deals to try and find those hidden gems and exciting sales on products that are actually awesome. Some days, it can be hard to find more than one or two that really wow me, but today it took no time at all to spot these all-star deals on vacuums, soundbars, smart speakers, protein powder, and tax software.