Google Home users got a surprise on Thursday when their virtual assistants cheerily mentioned that the live-action remake of "Beauty and the Beast" is opening in theaters this weekend. The ad seems to pop up when users ask for a rundown of their day, which kicks off the Home's "My Day" feature. That feature is supposed to offer users information about the weather, their calendars and relevant news. "By the way, Disney's live action'Beauty and The Beast' opens today," it says. "In this version of the story, Belle is the inventor instead of Maurice. That rings truer, if you ask me. For some more movie fun, ask me something about Belle."

Samsung's Italian support site let the Bixby name slip It's now been confirmed, by Samsung, on its own support pages that the Galaxy S8 will have a personal assistant called Bixby. Rumours have been about for some considerable time, but the company has clearly started getting its web services ready for the big day, and a mention of the AI system has leaked out. What's quite interesting here is that the page confirms that Bixby will be able to control all aspects of Samsung's touch interface. This is interesting if Samsung builds in the right apps to take advantage of this. Siri can already text and make calls, as well as play music or podcasts.

Amazon is taking Alexa to iOS in their latest app update. A link has been sent to your friend's email address. Amazon is taking Alexa to iOS in their latest app update.

Amazon Alexa is now closer to its main rival, Apple's Siri. This week, the Seattle-based electronic and cloud computing company updated its official iOS app to add support for its AI assistant. On Thursday, VentureBeat learned that Amazon is making its Alexa assistant available to iPhone users starting this week until the following week. This means when iPhone users receive an update for their Amazon app, they'll be getting not just certain improvements for the app's features, but also the intelligent assistant Alexa that boasts of over 10,000 skills. With the addition of Alexa into the Amazon iOS app, users will now see a microphone icon on the far right of the search box. This icon is dedicated to Alexa, so users have to press it to summon the AI assistant.

The California-based robot vacuum manufacturer has announced that Google Home support is coming to its Connected series vacuums. With the Botvac Connected already having Alexa integration, it was only a matter of time. If you are looking into getting a robot vacuum cleaner, you probably know the name. A California-based company that specializes in automated vacuums, Neato's Botvac series is arguably iRobot Roomba's biggest rival. I have the Botvac Connected for my apartment, and I personally thinks it's the best robot cleaner your money can buy right now.

Many discussions around artificial intelligence (AI) have focused on the new developments in machine learning, such as assisting with cancer recognition and even detecting earthquakes. However, the use of AI in the creation of a virtual assistant is starting to gain some traction. A recent article from VentureBeat stated that 2017 is the year that "virtual assistants really arrived." In this post, we wanted to look at the rise of virtual assistants and how they could change the way we work. It is hard to imagine an office desk these days without a computer.

Tune in April 7 and find out how to provide stellar customer care with social media in our free webinar. Artificial intelligence has quickly become part of our daily routine -- it powers everything from simple features like automatic image tagging on Facebook and purchase prediction on Amazon to more complex systems like smart cars and connected homes. We can even thank AI for HBO's hit TV series, Westworld, a sci-fi thriller about an amusement park populated with AI-powered robots called "hosts," that dominated the cultural zeitgeist this past fall. While the AI technology we interact with today gives us a hint at what's to come, it's actually Westworld that spells out the future most clearly. Before I get ahead of myself let me clarify: I don't foresee an apocalyptic robot takeover happening any time soon (or ever for that matter).

The e-commerce giant is introducing the virtual assistant to its shopping app iOS app, letting users converse with the AI on the go. However, the setup is less convenient than Apple's system, as users must to first open the app and then press the microphone icon before chatting – user simply say'Hey Siri' to activate the AI. The update will let iOS users ask Alexa questions, shop, play music and more – just by tapping the microphone icon in the search bar. Users will have the ability to control the slew of smart-home products that Amazon has to offer using Alexa. And iOS users who already use the app to control the smart speaker that houses Alexa, can now do so on the go.

NEW YORK, NY - OCTOBER 20: People visit the new Google pop-up shop in the SoHo neighborhood on October 20, 2016 in New York City. The shop lets people try out new Google products such as the Pixel phone, Google Home, and Daydream VR. The products will be available for purchase offsite at Verizon and Best Buy retail stores. Imagine the scene, you're relaxing at home about to head out for the day so you ask Google "what's the weather like" or "what meetings do I have" and what you get back is a spoken-word advert hastily stuck in the middle of your itinerary. New Beauty & the Beast promo is one way Google could monetize Home.

With the rise of automated personal assistants -- Alexa, Cortana, and countless others -- developers are faced with a big question: just how'human' should these robotic people be? The more human we make them, the more important it seems to give them names, personality and -- more worryingly -- gender. But robotic assistants don't have gender. Strip them of the names and voices added by their human creators, there's nothing there that requires a chat bot to be'he' or'she', other than our own assumptions. Yet still many chat bots have names, and a disproportionate number of them are sold to us as'female.'