A robot that evoked a human form paused in front of a door leading to a simulated nuclear power plant accident and inexplicably stood motionless. Suddenly, from the grandstands overlooking the scene, a group of schoolchildren began to chant: "Go Robot! What has long been thought of as a brave new world in which mobile robots freely move about in factories, towns and cities is now approaching. Robots will advance from the dull, dirty and dangerous work that they do today to take on a range of tasks, from rescue work to elder care in close contact with humans. Just as software robots such as Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Cortana have rapidly become useful personal assistants, physical robots will occupy a place in the near future. That is the world imagined by government officials and technologists at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the American military organization that is charged with the mission of avoiding a Sputnik-style technology threat to national security. Last weekend at the sprawling Los Angeles County Fairgrounds, Darpa concluded the Robotics Challenge, a two-year-long effort to jump start this next generation of smart and presumably helpful robots by offering a cash prize for the designers of a machine that could work in concert with human controllers in a hazardous environment. The $3.5 million competition was won by a South Korean team from the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. The technology may still seem far-fetched, but betting against the agency that has had a remarkably far-reaching effect on the modern world -- from funding the work that led to both the personal computer and the Internet, to setting expectations that self-driving vehicles are only a matter of years away -- might be a mistake. Darpa officials have taken pains to assure anyone who would listen that it was not primarily interested in designing Terminators, or killer robots. The agency is an arm of the Pentagon, and its futuristic robots are an example of what is described as a "dual use" technology that will have both military and civilian uses. Darpa, which is also known for pioneering the Internet surveillance system that was exposed last year by Edward J. Snowden, has, under its current director, Arati Prabhakar, expanded its watchfulness over the potential effect of the technologies it helps foster. In introducing a workshop for discussion on the effect of robotics held at the end of the challenge competition on Sunday, Dr. Prabhakar described the agency as being committed to a broader mission: "We work together to build the future of robots that can help extend the capabilities that we have and build the technologies that will aid humanity in the future.

During Apple's annual developers keynote at WWDC, Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Craig Federighi announced the company's latest mobile operating system, iOS 9. In addition to a refreshed user interface for the digital voice assistant Siri and a native News app, the update features a number of new tools specifically tailored for the iPad, Apple's tablet line. One notable change is the iPad's digital QuickType keyboard, which can now switch to a digital trackpad. Using a two-finger swipe, you can select, drag and paste large chunks of text more quickly and easily. Multitasking capabilities have also improved.

Apple unveiled a smarter Siri personal assistant on Monday that's picked up some features already offered by Google, but emphasized that it's improving Siri without compromising the company's commitment to user privacy. An update to the iPhone and iPad operating system coming this fall will deliver a Siri that's able to search through more apps than ever and offer users' information based on what it thinks they might want to know. That includes automatically adding event invitations to the Calendar app, telling iPhone holders who might be calling based on an unknown number matching one in an email and launching the Music app when someone plugs in headphones in the morning because that's become their routine. Apple made the announcement to kick off its weeklong Worldwide Developers Conference, a gathering for appmakers to learn about Apple products. "We think these kind of intelligence features make a huge difference in iOS 9," Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering, told an audience of media and software developers at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

Apple's voice assistant, Siri, has a new look as well as a host of enhancements. At its Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, Apple unveiled some key changes to its voice assistant. Siri boasts a new interface so it looks a bit more appealing. But perhaps most notably, Siri will be able to remind you of appointments and other events. That's a key enhancement as it's been one of the most unique features to Microsoft's Cortana voice assistant.

We consider the problem of designing locality sensitive hashes (LSH) for inner product similarity, and of the power of asymmetric hashes in this context. Shrivastava and Li (2014a) argue that there is no symmetric LSH for the problem and propose an asymmetric LSH based on different mappings for query and database points. However, we show there does exist a simple symmetric LSH that enjoys stronger guarantees and better empirical performance than the asymmetric LSH they suggest. We also show a variant of the settings where asymmetry is in-fact needed, but there a different asymmetric LSH is required.

The winning team of MOL Group's Freshhh 2015 competition truly learned the value of hard work. "Just ask Siri," the first-place winner of the competition in which students from across the globe compete in technology and business strategy simulations related to the oil and gas industry was made up of three students from the University of Economics, Prague and Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic. MOL Group experts are a part of the game development, so they make sure tasks are aligned with real-life situations, said Zdravka Demeter Bubalo, HR vice president of MOL Group. The top teams are invited to compete in the Live Final and present case studies connected to recent industry trends and issues. This strategy allows MOL Group to find the best global talent to join the company.

Hey Siri, turn off the kitchen light. The first "smart" home gadgets that can be controlled by Apple's voice-activated digital assistant are going on sale this week, just days after rival tech giant Google announced it's building its own software for Internet-connected home appliances and other gadgets. The new products could be an important step forward for the emerging industry of "smart" or "connected" homes, where appliances, thermostats and even door locks contain computer chips that communicate wirelessly. While a number of companies are working on similar products, analysts say Apple could persuade more consumers to try them by making it easy to control different products from a familiar device, such as the iPhone. Apple announced its "HomeKit" software project a year ago, but isn't making the new products.

Hey Siri, turn off the kitchen light. The first "smart" home gadgets that can be controlled by Apple's voice-activated digital assistant are going on sale this week, just days after rival tech giant Google announced it's building its own software for Internet-connected home appliances and other gadgets. The new products could be an important step forward for the emerging industry of "smart" or "connected" homes, where appliances, thermostats and even door locks contain computer chips that communicate wirelessly. While a number of companies are working on similar products, analysts say Apple could persuade more consumers to try them by making it easy to control different products from a familiar device, such as the iPhone. Apple announced its "HomeKit" software project a year ago, but isn't making the new products.

Chances are, Google (GOOGL, Tech30) kept every audio recording. And you can play them back to yourself. This is one of things some Google users were surprised to discover on Monday, when Google launched its new "My Account" feature. The company is trying to give users a better idea -- and more control -- over what information it collects. It's already obvious that Google remembers every text search you perform on its site.

In two months, Microsoft will return the Start Menu to the world. Windows 10 is arriving for download on July 29 -- and it's a free download for Windows 7 and Windows 8 users. After July of 2016, Windows 7 users have to pay.) Watch CNET Update below to learn about the big highlights of Windows 10, including Cortana and new security protection perks. Also in Update: Google just put all privacy and security settings in one place, and Asus has a new smartwatch that may remind you of another well-known watch: CNET Update delivers the tech news you need in under three minutes.