When Amazon first came out with a smart recommendation algorithm for customers, millions of consumers receive their first tailored shopping experience personalized to their own interests. This changed the consumer world and introduced us to a whole new era of shopping. Amazon's algorithms, using a method called "item-to-item collaborative filtering", are able to provide targeted shopping recommendations by creating a personalized experience for each person. Even in a very basic form, this was the beginning of using machine learning in a very practical manner. But can such artificial intelligence and machine learning also act as an enabler for changes in medicine and healthcare, as much as Amazon's algorithm changed consumerism?

We've been expecting voice-powered virtual assistants in financial apps for a while now -- Bank of America started developing its own back in 2016. Dubbed Erica, the virtual assistant is now ready to roll out to the bank's 25 million mobile clients across the US, from now through June of this year. Bank of America customers can use Erica to search for past transactions across all their accounts, navigate the mobile app to find routing numbers or the closest ATM, view bills and schedule payments, lock (and then unlock) debit cards and transfer money between accounts (or send money to others with Zelle). Erica will even help you learn more about your credit scores and connect you to the company's financial education product, Better Money Habits. Erica was trained in part with an employee-only pilot program last year, which helped the system integrate more than 200,000 ways for people to ask financial questions.

Apple hasn't shed much light on how its HomePod-connected speaker is selling, but research firm Strategy Analytics has some insight. The $349 speaker, Apple's high-end answer to the Amazon Echo and Google Home, doesn't look to be sizing up to an iPhone, iPad or even Apple Watch-sized hit. Strategy Analytics says Apple sold 600,000 HomePod speakers -- which first went on sale in February -- during the first quarter, representing 6% market share of the smart speaker market. At the same time, Amazon shipped some 4 million Echo speakers, representing 43.6% market share, to 2.4 million speakers for Google, which had 26.5% share. This is quite a drop for Amazon, which had 81.8% market share in the same quarter a year ago, to Google's then 12.4%.

As a contributor to The Fourth Education Revolution, Sir Anthony Seldon's new book on artificial intelligence (AI) in education, I've been thinking a lot recently about how AI could help in teaching and learning. Perhaps a few years from now we'll see widespread use of "digital tutors" that help reduce teacher workload by coaching and mentoring learners, building on the likes of Siri and Alexa. But there's also a darker side that we need to be wary of. It emerges that a pupil has been cheating by submitting homework assignments generated by an artificial intelligence. Another pupil has pranked the school's IT systems by feeding them false data, resulting in the heating being turned up to full blast on the hottest day of the year.

It was the haircut booking heard round the world. On May 8, Google demoed a new Google Assistant feature called Duplex, a technology designed to tackle our tedious phone conversations. Don't feel like making a restaurant reservation or calling the salon? Let an AI do it for you. During the AI demo, Google CEO Sundar Pichai told the audience, "What you're going to hear is the Google Assistant actually calling a real salon to schedule an appointment for you."

Google is working on some nifty new features for Google Maps, including a short list of your favorite places, the possibility of a'virtual positioning system' and more. Assistant is coming to Google Maps in a big way, with a ton of new shortcuts, as well as the ability for the digital assistant to text your friend when you're on your way. Google is rolling out a tool called'Your Match', which uses machine learning to determine your location and interests, serving up targeted suggestions for new businesses opening up in your area and more.

Am I the only one who feels a tad underwhelmed by Google Duplex? My social media feeds are filled with gushing platitudes over the virtual assistant's handling of a simple haircut appointment. Some are even claiming the Turing Test has been passed. Putting aside the ethical ramifications of abdicating such tasks to the robots (a topic worthy of its own post), I'm left wondering: is this how low we've set the bar for human conversation? Google Duplex may score top marks for authentic tone and delightful mannerisms, but the topic of conversation was hardly riveting.

Samsung's Bixby voice assistant is lagging behind the likes of Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa in terms of speed and voice recognition. However, that might finally change as the company has confirmed that Bixby 2.0 will launch later this year. Head of AI at Samsung Research Gary G. Lee told the Korean Herald that Bixby 2.0 will launch alongside the Galaxy Note 9, which is rumored to be released in August. Lee also confirmed that Bixby 2.0 will come with upgraded and enhanced natural language process, improved noise resistance and quicker response times. The current version of Bixby is able to answer most queries easily, but the problem is that users must be very specific in how they ask questions.

It is no secret that Google optimizes all of their services on a regular basis, with 2018 being a year that has been introducing another set of updates. Some of these updates include the implementation of infinite scrolling on Google mobile search, removing the "View Image" option, along with the addition of title tags on Google Images, and the addition of Google Speed in the next few months. Another major Google service that will be receiving updates in the near future is Google Assistant, which is one of the best AI assistants currently available. While this app can already perform functions such as open applications, search for nearby locations, and respond to search queries, Google demonstrated what else it could possibly do in the future. At the I/O Developer's conference on May 8, 2018, Google CEO Sundar Pichai presented some of Google Assistant's upcoming features.

Personal assistants such as Amazon's Alexa or the Google Assistant are growing in popularity, and children love them. Unfortunately, children have also been proven to abuse robots – so scientists in Seoul, South Korea are trying to teach kids that this isn't OK. Do we need to be worried about the way that we learn to interact with robots? Is there any risk that it will impact how we interact with other humans? And does that change when Google and the rest are also trying to make their artificial intelligences sound as deceptively human as possible?