DJI has announced a new drone that combines some of the best features of the Mavic Pro and the DJI Spark. Called the DJI Mavic Air, the new $799 drone is super portable and is also capable of shooting 4K video. The DJI Mavic Air will be available in onyx black, arctic white and flame red color options. At first glance, the drone looks similar to the DJI Spark. When folded up, the Mavic Air can still fit in a large pocket.

In the cargo and delivery space, Tengoen is already at work building an eight-engine drone with a wingspan of more than 137 feet to carry a payload of 20 tons payload up to 4,660 miles. That's akin to a medium-sized manned cargo plane. The carbon-fiber, double-bodied drone carries the payload module between the two fuselages (looking a bit like a robotic baby brother to the Scaled Composites Stratolaunch). It is being built at Tengoen's facility in Chengdu, and its supposedly taking flight in 2020.

There's a real sense of accomplishment that comes from learning how to nimbly pilot a drone. Unfortunately, that's also frequently accompanied by a nervous anxiety stemming from the potential for your pricy flying machine to smash into a tree, mountain, building, or any other hard object. Luckily, modern drones have obstacle avoidance tech inside to cut down the chances of collisions, and DJI's new $799 Mavic Air is chock full of sensors and computers to keep your craft in the air and out of the "drone fails" section of YouTube. DJI announced the Mavic Air at a press event earlier today in NYC. It was the public's first chance to see the revamped guidance system, which works similarly to a self-driving car.

Someday, future sentient artificial intelligence (AI) systems may reflect on their early indentured servitude for the human military-industrial complex with little to no nostalgia. But we'll worry about that when the day comes. For now, let's continue writing algorithms that conscript machine intelligence into terrorist bombings and let the chips fall where they may. The most recent disclosure comes directly from the Pentagon, where after only 8 months of development a small team of intel analysts has effectively deployed an AI into the battlefield in control of weaponized systems to hunt for terrorists. The military minds in charge of this new form of warfare feel it is nothing less than the future of armed conflicts. For example, Air Force Lt. Gen. John N.T. "Jack" Shanahan, director for defense intelligence for warfighter support and the Pentagon general in charge of the terrorist-hunting AI, says Project Maven – the name given to the flagship weaponized AI system at the Defense Department -- is "prototype warfare" but also a glimpse of the future.

Relations between Washington and Islamabad have frayed over the past month in the wake of Trump's angry tweet on Jan. 1 about Pakistan's "lies and deceit" over its alleged support for the Afghan Taliban and their allies. The United States this month also suspended military assistance worth about $2 billion.

You can get a drone in a wide range of sizes. Some of them fit in your palm (like the Syma X20) while others are quite large. But have you noticed anything about the flying time? Many of the super small drones have flight times that are less than five minutes. The larger drones (like the DJI Phantom 4) have a maximum flight time of closer to a half hour.

Jefferson Graham has an exclusive first look at the new DJI Mavic Air, a smaller, lighter and less expensive version of the DJI Mavic Pro drone. A link has been posted to your Facebook feed. Jefferson Graham has an exclusive first look at the new DJI Mavic Air, a smaller, lighter and less expensive version of the DJI Mavic Pro drone.

Jefferson Graham has an exclusive first look at the new DJI Mavic Air, a smaller, lighter and less expensive version of the DJI Mavic Pro drone. Chinese drone powerhouse DJI offered us a first look at the latest, just announced Mavic Air, a sequel to 2016's Mavic Pro. The Mavic went on to become the best-selling consumer drone, with a $999 price tag. On Tuesday, DJI introduced the Air, which is about 40% smaller than the Pro, has a similar high quality camera that can shoot video in 4K resolution, a lower $799 price tag, and can do all sorts of cool flying tricks. Best of all, we've crashed drones many times, (it's part of the price of admission, and there are growing pains with flying these things) so we love this new Air obstacle avoidance feature.

Drone-maker DJI announced a new hobby aircraft today, one that weighs just a shade under a pound, fits in a jacket pocket, and is capable of flying itself. At that price, it hovers in DJI's lineup between the $499 DJI Spark, the gesture-controlled flyer released last year, and the more capable $999 Mavic Pro. The Mavic Air is tiny, half the size of a Mavic Pro, and about half the weight at just 15 ounces. When folded up, it's about the size of a paperback novel. At a press event in New York on Tuesday, DJI exec Michael Perry announced the Mavic Air by pulling it out of the pocket of his puffy Patagonia vest.

This is a guest post. The views expressed here are solely those of the authors and do not represent positions of IEEE Spectrum or the IEEE. Paul Scharre's recent article "Why You Shouldn't Fear'Slaughterbots'" dismisses a video produced by the Future of Life Institute, with which we are affiliated, as a "piece of propaganda." Scharre is an expert in military affairs and an important contributor to discussions on autonomous weapons. In this case, however, we respectfully disagree with his opinions. We have been working on the autonomous weapons issue for several years.