When it comes to communication, humans are hugely sensitive to each other's emotional states. Indeed, most people expect their emotional state to be taken into account by their correspondents. And when this happens, communication tends to be more effective. So if computers are ever to interact effectively with humans, they will need some way of repeating this trick and assessing the emotional state of their interlocutors. Understanding whether an individual has a positive or negative state of mind could make a huge difference to the quality of response that a computer might give.

We hear about AI taking over our jobs. We hear about AI listening in on our conversations. We hear about AI becoming a substitute for our romantic partners. Here's what the real AI experts Guru Banavar, (IBM), Toby Walsh, (The University of New South Wales), and Roman Yampolskiy (University of Louisville), say about the subject, and why a lot of what you think you know is probably wrong. Humans 2.0: How the robot revolution is going to change how we see, feel, and talk Robots aren't going to replace us, but by working hand in hand with us they will redefine what it means to be human.

OutsideIQ develops innovative artificial intelligence solutions that use big data to address complex risk-based questions and problems. ABC and FCPA policies require corporations to uphold proper compliance processes. OutsideIQ provides a fully auditable and sourced due diligence report, allowing corporations to operate without additional changes to their infrastructure. We are occupying a world where data is more than a commodity, it is becoming a currency, providing real value to companies who can efficiently extract data to gain a competitive advantage over their competitors and make better decisions. Over the years, big data technology has been in a revolution, developing new ways to find value in data.

Graphics processors power more than the likes of Call of Duty: Black Ops III; they also provide the number-crunching for modern machine learning systems. But GPUs are largely proprietary hardware devices, led in the market by Nvidia, which is notorious for its poor reputation as an open source player. Leave it to Nvidia's competitor AMD, long beleaguered by slumping sales and shrinking market share, to develop a plan with the partial goal of advancing the state of GPU-accelerated high-performance computing. Thus, while AMD hopes to make GPU programming less of a black box with GPUOpen, the company is trying to rescue its own business as well. After all, AMD's reputation with open source users is also shaky, thanks to unfulfilled promises.

The number of new malware variations that pop up each day runs somewhere between 390,000 (according to AV-TEST Institute) and one million (according to Symantec Corporation). These are new strains of malware that have not been seen in the wild before. Even if we consider just the low end figure, the situation is still dire. Google Now is about to get a lot better in the future, aiming to serve Android users even when they're offline. With smartphones increasingly gaining ground, digital assistants have become widely popular and heavyweight companies are competing to deliver the best software in this category.

Machine learning is an obvious complement to a cloud service that also handles big data. Often the major reason to collect massive amounts of observables is to predict other values of interest to the business. For example, one of the reasons to collect massive numbers of anonymized credit card transactions is to predict whether a new transaction is valid or fraudulent with some likelihood. It's no surprise then that Microsoft, with a large AI research department, would add machine learning facilities to its Azure cloud. Perhaps because the technology originated with the researchers, the commercial offering has all of the complex models and algorithms that a statistics and data weenie could want.

Every age has its iconic images. One of the more terrifying ones of the 21st century is the image of a man in desert or army fatigues making a "V for victory" sign with raised arm while standing over the decapitated body of a Western victim. In most of these images, the perpetrator's face and head are covered with a scarf or hood to hide his identity. That has forced military and law enforcement agencies to identify these individuals in other ways, such as with voice identification. This is not always easy or straightforward, so there is significant interest in finding new ways.

We all know that alcohol and tweeting is not always a good combination. Yet a surprising number of us indulge in this peculiar form of indiscretion. And this practice has given Nabil Hossain and pals at the University of Rochester an interesting idea. Today, these guys show how they've trained a machine to spot alcohol-related tweets. And they also show how to use this data to monitor alcohol-related activity and the way it is distributed throughout society.

For example, Dean's affinity for cats comes in handy with his line of work. In this context, cats are a mere vehicle for determining how much a computer can see, learn, communicate and understand. It also turns out that machines and humans are complementary in skills. While some computers are capable of beating a human opponent in a game such as Go, it's challenging for the same computers to perform more interpretive functions such as identifying and describing images. On the other hand, humans (and cats) are challenged by performing algorithmic functions on large sets of data, a task at that machines excel at.

For outsiders, the idea of artificial intelligence in the court room sounds horrifying. AI, however, has been pushing its way into law for decades. The next time you apply to claim child benefits, you may be met with the unexpected: robots. Most might not even notice it, but the future of law is heavily tied to Artificial Intelligence. In fact, the slow integration of AI into the legal sphere has been happening for decades, and several magazines, news sources and committees have been built around the topic.