Not all consumers share the enthusiasm of Google and Apple though, and rarely - if ever - use Google Assistant and Siri. Whether you use them or not, by default the two assistants are always listening out for their trigger words, and this uses up battery life. On Android, you can switch this off by going to Settings, Google, Search, Voice and "Ok Google" detection. On iOS, go to Settings, Siri and Allow "Hey Siri". Virtual assistants are becoming increasingly capable, and therefore increasingly important in tech companies' eyes.

Anker, the China-based accessory maker, blew up on Amazon with a simple plan: make decent-quality versions of everyday gadgets lots of people want, and sell them for less than Apple or Samsung. They don't have fancy TV ads or cool packaging, but they do have a pile of good reviews and Prime shipping. The company started with portable chargers, but now its Bluetooth headphones, portable speakers, dash cams, and Lightning cables are all among the best-reviewed and most popular products in their category. If that strategy sounds familiar, by the way, it should: It's straight out of the Amazon Basics playbook. Anker's latest Amazon-conquering move goes even further.

Tom Romeo is general manager of U.S. Federal Services at MAXIMUS. At a recent event, Chris Liddell, assistant to the president and director of strategic initiatives, spoke about the White House Office of American Innovation's focus on improving federal customer service, with the ultimate goal of providing citizens with "the same experience as they [receive] in the private sector." As noted by Liddell and other senior officials, modernizing the government's outdated legacy systems will be an important part of this process. But this effort can also include incorporating more AI and machine learning-driven technologies into the systems that directly handle an enormous amount of citizen requests: engagement and contact centers. Today, and in the near future, voice is expected to remain the most prominent channel for citizens to interact with the government.

You've probably encountered the term "machine learning" more than a few times lately. Often used interchangeably with artificial intelligence, machine learning is in fact a subset of AI, both of which can trace their roots to MIT in the late 1950s. Machine learning is something you probably encounter every day, whether you know it or not. The Siri and Alexa voice assistants, Facebook's and Microsoft's facial recognition, Amazon and Netflix recommendations, the technology that keeps self-driving cars from crashing into things – all are a result of advances in machine learning. While still nowhere near as complex as a human brain, systems based on machine learning have achieved some impressive feats, like defeating human challengers at chess, Jeopardy, Go, and Texas Hold'em.

It was a rough weekend at Google. On Friday, a 10-page memo titled "Google's Ideological Echo Chamber" started circulating on the company's internal networks, arguing that the disparities between men and women in tech and leadership roles were rooted in biology, not bias. By Saturday afternoon, the tech news site Gizmodo had obtained and published the entire thing. The author, a male software engineer, argued that women were more neurotic and less stress-tolerant than men; that they were less likely to pursue status than men; that they were less interested in the "systematizing" work of programming. "We need to stop assuming that gender gaps imply sexism," he concluded before offering recommendations.

Writer, commentator, and professor Roxane Gay joins Prudie this week for your questions! How do I avoid matching with my students on online dating apps? Should I report the places my ex-husband frequented for sex for human trafficking? I'm in love with a prude--how do I spice up our sex life? I just found out I have a 6-year-old son and I'm furious with his mother's choices.

One of Mark Zuckerberg's key New Year resolutions for 2016 was to build his own "simple AI bot" that could help him with the household tasks. Remember the image of the butler, Jarvis from Iron Man? That's a classic Hollywood example of how AI works. But, what precisely is Artificial Intelligence and how can it solve the most common UX problems today? Artificial Intelligence (or AI) is an advanced human-like computerized system that has the ability to intelligently manage the activities and systems which humans usually do manually. While bots like Apple's Siri and Amazon's Echo are programmed to take on our most mundane tasks, bots like Google's Deep Dream are inherently creative, helping users in problem-solving, thereby improving their experience.

Voice AI is emerging as a winner among the many new outlets for brands to express themselves. In the twenty years since Google and Amazon were founded, the physical world has begun to be transformed into a huge voice-activated web fueled by smart speakers, Google Home, and Amazon Echo. Forty-five million voice-assisted devices are currently in use in the U.S., and eMarketer projects that number will rise to 67 million by 2019. Amazon Echo, and its brain, Alexa, own nearly 70 percent of the smart speaker market and Steve Rabuchin, VP Amazon Alexa said, "Our vision is that customers will be able to access Alexa whenever and wherever they want." "That means customers may be able to talk to their cars, refrigerators, thermostats, lamps and all kinds of devices in and outside their homes."

On August 31, 2012, four Amazon engineers filed the fundamental patent for what ultimately became Alexa, an artificial--intelligence system designed to engage with one of the world's biggest and most tangled data sets: human speech. The engineers needed just 11 words and a simple diagram to describe how it would work. A male user in a quiet room says: "Please play'Let It Be,' by the Beatles." A small tabletop machine replies: "No problem, John," and begins playing the requested song. From that modest start, voice-based AI for the home has become a big business for Amazon and, increasingly, a strategic battleground with its technology rivals. Google, Apple, Samsung, and Microsoft are each putting thousands of researchers and business specialists to work trying to create irresistible versions of easy-to-use devices that we can talk with. "Until now, all of us have bent to accommodate tech, in terms of typing, tapping, or swiping.

Soon enough, your breakfast bar could be your search bar. Your lamp could be how you shop for lightbulbs. Your Chevy or Ford might be your vehicle for finding a YouTube video, like the classic SNL skit of Chevy Chase's send-up of President Gerald Ford, to make a long drive less tedious. And you won't have to lift a finger--all you'll need to do is turn toward one of those inanimate objects and say something. Welcome to a future where your voice is the main signal for the elaborate data grid known as your life. Two decades ago when Amazon and Google were founded, only a seer could have predicted that those companies would eventually start turning the physical world into a vast, voice-activated interface.