App developers rely on user demographics to effectively target their audiences – but just how much information do your apps really reveal about you? According to a new study, it might be more than you think. Researchers analysed the app choices of thousands of Android users to determine the predictability of certain attributes, and found that apps can provide insight on your gender, age, and even income. Researchers analysed the app choices of thousands of Android users to determine the predictability of certain attributes, and found that apps can provide insight on your gender, age, and even income. In the paper, published to the journal arXiv, researchers with Verto Analytics in Finland and the Qatar Computing Research Institute created a model based on the demographic attributes and apps of 3,760 Android users.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is on quite a run, from Google's AlphaGo, which earlier this year defeated Go world champion Lee Sedol four games to one, to Amazon's Echo, the voice-activated digital assistant. The trend is heating up the sales field as well, enabling entirely new ways of selling. Purchasing, for example, is moving to automated bots, with 15%–20% of total spend already sourced through e-platforms. By 2020 customers will manage 85% of their relationship with an enterprise without interacting with a human. Leading companies are experimenting with what these technologies can do for them, typically around transactional processes at early stages of the customer journey.

Tech giant Google held its annual I/O developers conference I/O 2016 from May 18 to May 20. The well-known 3-day-event for developers all over the world kicked off with a 2 hour keynote by Google CEO Sundar Pichai who showcased previews of Google's latest products such as Google Assistant, Google Home, two messaging technologies Allo and Duo, and many more. Google's focus of this year's conference was on how to make people's life easier by offering them the right tools that can assist them at the right time and help them with small household tasks such as order movie tickets, make dinner reservations, check their flight tickets, etc. "Google Home is the stake in the ground in Google bringing a smart assistant into the home -- and in the bigger picture, a connected life within the future smart home that is built around their interfaces," Paul Erickson, senior analyst at IHS Technology said for TechNewsWorld. "A connected speaker is only one manifestation of that -- a Google voice interface could just as easily be part of mic-equipped smart appliances, smoke detectors, thermostats, and AV devices from different brands," he added. Trying to launch new products as a firm response to its competitors such as Amazon and Facebook, which are using Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to their best interest, Google is making its best to help users with household tasks so that they can in turn focus on more important things going on in their lives.

Apple's Siri made a big splash when the wisecracking digital assistant debuted on the iPhone five years ago. But as other tech giants jockey to build intelligent "chat bots" and voice-controlled home systems capable of more challenging artificial-intelligence feats, Siri at times no longer seems cutting edge. On Monday, Apple is expected to demonstrate an upgrade to Siri's smarts as it kicks off its annual software conference. It's a potentially momentous time for the company; sales of its flagship iPhone are slowing, and AI is emerging as a key tech battleground. Apple, Google, Facebook and others are racing to create digital services that consumers will find indispensable for shopping, chatting, controlling other appliances and simply getting through their daily lives.

We met up with Régis Vincent, Head of Software at SRI Robotics, a unit of SRI International, which is a non-profit, independent research centre serving government and industry. Located in Menlo Park at the heart of Silicon Valley, SRI International runs projects for government agencies, notably the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) – the US Ministry of Defence agency which develops technologies for military use – as well as private sector players, both large firms and startups – intended to develop disruptive innovations. The stated aim of SRI International is to move R&D from the laboratory to the marketplace. SRI is hardly a household name, but the organisation has nevertheless been behind a large number of the devices which we now use in our daily lives. Since the research centre was founded 65 years ago, its engineers have been closely involved in the development of such innovations as colour television then colour photographic film in the 1950s, ultrasound for medical diagnostics in the 1980s, computers as we know them today, Arpanet, a 1960s precursor to the Internet, and more recently Siri – the first-ever virtual personal assistant, later acquired by Apple.

Which are the ripest areas for startups to disrupt using machine learning? At the core, machine learning/artificial intelligence relies on two key ingredients: advanced algorithms and data sets to train those algorithms. Novel algorithms are increasingly making their way into the public domain in the form of open-source libraries. So, the key differentiator for startups and ultimately long-term competitive advantage is access to proprietary data sets. In the consumer world, there are natural and intrinsic monopolies at play.

Last month, Google took the stage in Mountain View, California, to show off improvements to its digital voice assistant. Its signature ability is to have a conversation with it like you would a normal person. You can ask "Google Assistant" what's on your schedule and then have it text the person you're meeting to say you'll be late. Google remembers your first question, so you don't have to start over with a new command. Like a real person, it builds off what you were talking about earlier.

This sounds like science-fiction, I know, but so did talking to a digital assistant in a powerful pocket-sized touch screen computer fifteen years ago. As the data has shown the current, "warehouse of apps" app model does not work efficiently with human behavior. The 2014 Comscore Mobile App Report shows that 7% of the smartphone using population downloads 50% of the apps. When incorporated into the rest of the population that averages to just one download per user per month. This data is supported by app discovery activity data that reveals a mere 27% of the smartphone using population (millennials) uses the app store to discover apps as shown in the 2015 Comscore Mobile App Report.

She was a 22-year old aspiring model from Brooklyn. Searching for a way to crack into the industry, she turned to ModelMayhem.com, a website that connects freelance models to casting agents, photographers and others in the business. She flew down to Miami to meet the agent she had met online and, upon her arrival, he drugged and raped her. Her brutal assault was filmed and posted on the porn website Miami's Nastiest Nymphos. She awoke bruised and disoriented in a motel room with no knowledge of how she got there.

Artificial Intelligence and machine learning were the big themes at last week's Code Conference, just like most of the similar conferences I've attended this year. It's a topic on everyone's mind, driven by huge advances in hardware, such as GPUs, FPGAs and custom-built ASICs; software, such as deep learning neural nets; and applications such as natural language processing, image recognition, and conversational assistants. These themes were echoed by just about all of the speakers at the show, with a number commenting on the rapid advances in the field. Asked about AI in part of a broader conversation, Bill Gates said it is the big dream for anybody who has ever been involved in computer science. "It's the most exciting thing going on right now," he said.