Apple has been put on notice by Samsung's big Bixby virtual assistant in the Galaxy S8. But the iPhone maker apparently has some big changes of its own up its sleeve. Apple has filed for a patent on a deep learning technology that would turn Siri into an exceedingly powerful tool that could digitally "see" and deliver better assistance to users. The patent, which was earlier discovered by Patently Apple, describes how a device could use sensor to constantly analyze what's going on around the hardware. From there, it responds with something it believes, you'll want it to do.

The home smart hub war is currently split into two camps: Google vs. Amazon. Both systems have their pros and cons, but as the tech has evolved, users have had to choose either one or the other. Now, a third-party speaker system could give indecisive smart home owners another option: Clarity, a wireless smart hub with both Alexa and Google Assistant functionality. Its makers claim its the first standalone device in which the competing smart assistants play nice. To sweeten the deal, it has a 7-inch touchscreen system running Android 6.0 Marshmallow, giving the hub some extra visual and textile functionality you won't find in the Amazon Echo or Google Home--at least not yet.

Stephen Hawking famously said, "The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race." Before that happens, however, the emergence of AI-driven sales technology will almost certainly spell the end of selling as we know it now -- and could spell the end of the line for businesses that don't appreciate the power in the next wave of technology. Imagine a digital sales assistant that responds to verbal commands. Those commands could be simple -- "call the next most qualified lead in my queue," for example. Or they could be complex -- "provide an analysis of which up-sell offers have worked best for prospects like the one I'm working on." Such assistants -- when connected to large data sets of sales and marketing automation data -- will allow salespeople to work at the speed of their thoughts, rather than at the speed their systems allow them to work.

"AI is the new UI" may be a cliché now. But back in 2011 when Apple first released Siri, the capability to control a mobile device by talking to it through an intelligent assistant was revolutionary. Granted, Siri wasn't as smart as HAL in the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey" or Eddy, the shipboard computer in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," but it made enough of an impact on consumer technology to spawn a stream of similar intelligent assistants. And these will likely be joined soon by many others, including Samsung's Bixby, which is based on technology Samsung acquired when it bought Viv, a company founded by the people behind Siri. And just as the iPhone took off when Apple opened it up to third-party app makers, the key to the success of these intelligent assistants may well be the ability for third-party developers to access them and employ them as a user interface to their applications.

Eighty percent of marketing leaders say that AI will "revolutionize" marketing by 2020, but many CMOs remain paralyzed on the sidelines, questioning how this kind of bleeding-edge tech should be used and if it will provide a marked return on investment. Ironically enough, at the same time we talk about the uncertainty that an artificial intelligence-powered future could bring, we are increasingly adopting these experiences into our day-to-day lives. From Siri and self-driving cars to connected devices like Amazon Echo and customer service chatbots, experiences powered by artificial intelligence will soon be the norm. Even though marketers generally accept AI's growing influence, they hesitate to adopt it (though they may not realize that if their brand invests in programmatic media buying, for example, they're already deeply immersed in the world of AI). But although marketers are liberally leaning on AI to drive media buying and automate customer service, they struggle when it comes to its role within the creative puzzle.

Artificial intelligence will have a hand in how people meet in the future, according to Tinder's chairman and co-founder. Sean Rad discussed the progression of dating, the future of the matchmaking app and how AI might influence that during the Forbes Under 30 Summit in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Monday. "AI is going to empower new user experiences. I think in the future, you're going to be working less for the answer that you're looking for. As devices get smarter, you're just going to get the results," said Rad. "It's not hard to imagine a world where you're talking to your device…there's an enmeshment between what your tech can do and what you're experiencing in real time."

While many businesses have been speedy adopters of emerging and disruptive technologies, banking and the financial services industry has been seen to lag behind. This could be chalked up to a myriad of factors including complex legacy systems or even the fact that a significant portion of high value clients, particularly for wealth management firms and IFAs, are more likely to belong to senior demographics and may have a higher propensity for non-digital communication such as calls or face-to-face meetings. Because of this, a significant proportion of FS businesses may not have felt the need to invest in digital. This is also potentially exacerbated by the fact that their competitors and cohorts are also lagging in terms of digital. Research by Econsultancy and Adobe shows that 9% of FS businesses claim to be digital-first, compared to 11% across all sectors.

The latest technology now is artificial intelligence. The importance of this technology cannot be over emphasized. This is why app developers usually make use of it in many app development projects. To underscore the usefulness of artificial intelligence, some of its applications have been outlined below. The industry that first made use of artificial intelligence is the video game industry.

Make no mistake, we're still probably at least a decade away from any kind of meaningful shift away from the smartphone. Assuming we're still eating at all, I guess.) Yet, piece by piece, the groundwork for the eventual demise of the smartphone is being laid by Elon Musk, by Microsoft, by Facebook, by Amazon, and a countless number of startups that still have a part to play. And, let me tell you: If and when the smartphone does die, that's when things are going to get really weird for everybody. Not just in terms of individual products, but in terms of how we actually live our everyday lives and maybe our humanity itself.

"Does the world really need another wedding photographer?" That was the thought that ran through Saskia Nelson's mind when, having spontaneously resigned from her office job at a London Olympics legacy project, she was thinking of her next move. An amateur photographer, she decided four years ago, aged 43, that she was going to go professional. But she hadn't really worked out how, and so she used her three-month notice period to consider her options, one of which was to join the army of wedding snappers. "But I thought, 'I'm not married, it's not my bag, I don't really know anything about it,'" says Saskia.