There wasn't any one big product announcement at Google I/O keynote on Wednesday,the annual event when thousands of programmers meet to learn about Google's software platforms. Instead, it was a steady trickle of incremental improvements across Google's product portfolio. And almost all of the improvements were driven by breakthroughs in artificial intelligence --the software's growing ability to understand complex nuances of the world around it. Companies have been hyping artificial intelligence for so long -- and often delivering such mediocre results -- that it's easy to tune it out. AI is also easy to underestimate because it's often used to add value to existing products rather than creating new ones.

It turns out the smart mirror in the smart home is actually a smart camera, what a surprise! With talks of Snap Inc. becoming a "camera company" and Facebook resounding in its ability to replicate the trends as usual, it's a bit ironic that Alexa now is not just a "smart speaker", but can literally live inside your camera. That's the beauty of the evolution of computer vision and machine learning. Since Amazon's native image recognition technology, "Reokognition", can do facial analysis, it's a shoe-in that sentiment analytics can be easily integrated into how Amazon can potentially live in your closet.

Whether we want AI or not, it is going to be an important feature in our lives. While the first iterations did not attract many, with systems getting more intelligent, AI is certainly bound to attract more users. So, it was not a surprise when Google announced an AI-first strategy at its I/O conference this year. Basically, what this means is that Google will try to integrate as many services with its Assistant as it can over the coming years. Say, if one wants to book a cab-ride or a flight ticket, she would be able to do so using Google's services as the company integrates more apps across the platform.

On Thursday 4 May 2017, Hogan Lovells' Tech Hub hosted Azeem Azhar, renowned strategist, product entrepreneur and writer, who spoke about the current status and implications of Artificial Intelligence ("AI"). Far from being a futuristic ambition, we are living in a world where countless daily activities are powered by AI. Whilst Artificial General Intelligence may yet be a few years away, we are seeing applications of Artificial Narrow Intelligence across a range of use cases from virtual personal assistants to news generation, personalised content and movie recommendations. As Azeem outlined, this penetration of AI over the past few years has been growing exponentially. This has been enabled by the combination of progress in three critical areas, each of which supports and feeds into the other – processing power, availability of data and innovations in machine learning. Our ability to exploit these technological developments as consumers and businesses has been dramatically enhanced by the availability and accessibility of a range of devices on different platforms (iOS, Android, enterprise IT, etc.) which have themselves been further enabled by the advanced integration of software with real world.

You made it to the end of a long week. Here's your prize: an extended edition of our podcast from Thursday, where we discussed Google I/O's announcements. The I/O developers conference offered new details about Google's plans for Android, Google Assistant and Google Lens -- so much that we had a bit of trouble squeezing it all into three minutes and 59 seconds. Luckily, on the extended edition, there's more chatter about Google Photos, Google Assistant on iPhones (sorry Siri!), and augmented reality. So, kick back and enjoy our extended podcast this weekend.

Columnist Marc Saltzman shows all the new hands-free options for while you drive. If your vehicle doesn't have built-in Bluetooth, aftermarket speakerphones like the Parrot Minikit are simple to install and use. Perhaps there's one silver lining to battling the daily commute: you can stay productive and connected while behind the wheel – safely – thanks to today's hands-free technology. After all, holding a phone up to your ear can be a major distraction to those driving, while texting on a phone is even worse. Not only could you face a serious fine for distracted driving, but you might hurt yourself or others, or cause damage to your vehicle.

If Google I/O 2017 had a tagline, it might be something like "Rise of the Machine Learning." The biggest thread throughout the keynote was an aggressive push to fully move from a mobile-first world to an AI-first world, changing the way we use Google and our devices to look at everything around us. It used to be about algorithms, but now it's about artificial intelligence. Google doesn't simply want to be the tool we use in our browsers to find something, it wants to be within reach whenever we have a question, whether or not we're even looking at a screen. We already see it with Google Assistant on Google Home, but now Google is starting to pull search out of our phones and apps in order to make it accessible everywhere.

Google is set to let users pay off their debts without lifting a finger. The tech giant has announced a new feature that will allow users to transfer funds to friends or family via Google Assistant. Those living in the US will just say'Ok Google, send $10 to Jane for pizza', and the AI will pull money from a linked debit card and forward it to the recipient. Google announced a new feature that will allow users to transfer funds to friends or family via Google Assistant. Those living in the US will just say'Ok Google, send $25 to Manuel Martinez', and the AI will pull money from a linked debit card and forward it to the recipient Google is rolling out a feature that lets users add a credit or debit card to their Google Account, enabling them to easily purchase goods online without.

Spotify's editorial selection and music discovery process are hard to beat (ahem, Google Play Music) and it might get a little better with the company's latest acquisition. The music streaming service has just picked up Niland, a Paris-based machine learning startup that focuses on music search and recommendations. "The team from Niland will join our New York office and help Spotify continue innovating and improving our recommendation and personalization technologies resulting in more music discovery, which benefits both fans and artists," a press release says. "The best part of our journey was hearing from our clients how they were using Niland API to create innovative products that help musicians cut through the noise," Niland writes. Spotify has absorbed AI-minded companies in the past, and its Discover Weekly playlists have proven pretty popular with listeners.

On Wednesday, the showcase started with a keynote from CEO Sundar Pichai who reiterated the company's latest approach for all that it does: artificial intelligence (AI). Google does a lot, from its original search engine function, to email, video services, and mobile software -- and the company wants to see AI will be at the helm of it all. Pichar highlighted this "AI-first" focus, something he mentioned at the I/O last year. Now, Google has given the rest of the world a glimpse of how machine learning will work behind every platform it has. Of course, there's no amount of AI and machine learning-based tech that can work without a specialized processor to run them.