This study explores the effectiveness of applying AI and gamification into a presentation platform aimed at University students wanting to improve their public speaking skills in their native tongue. Specifically, a platform based on the radio show, Just a Minute (JAM), is explored. In this game, players are challenged to speak fluently on a topic for 60 seconds without repeating themselves, hesitating or deviating from the topic. JAM has proposed benefits such as allowing students to improve their spontaneous speaking skills and reduce their use of speech disfluencies ("um", "uh", etc.). Previous research has highlighted the difficulties students face when speaking publicly, the main one being anxiety. AI Powered Presentation Platforms (AI-PPPs), where students can speak with an immersive AI audience and receive real-time feedback, have been explored as a method to improve student's speaking skills and confidence. So far they have shown promising results which this study aims to build upon. A group of students from the University of York are enlisted to evaluate the effectiveness of the JAM platform. They are asked to fill in a questionnaire, play through the game twice and then complete a final questionnaire to discuss their experiences playing the game. Various statistics are gathered during their gameplay such as the number of points they gained and the number of rules they broke. The results showed that students found the game promising and believed that their speaking skills could improve if they played the game for longer. More work will need to be carried out to prove the effectiveness of the game beyond the short term.

This research aims to demonstrate that AI can function not only as a tool for learning, but also as an intelligent agent with which humans can engage in collaborative learning (CL) to change epistemic practices in science classrooms. We adopted a design and development research approach, following the Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation and Evaluation (ADDIE) model, to prototype a tangible instructional system called Collaborative Learning with AI Speakers (CLAIS). The CLAIS system is designed to have 3-4 human learners join an AI speaker to form a small group, where humans and AI are considered as peers participating in the Jigsaw learning process. The development was carried out using the NUGU AI speaker platform. The CLAIS system was successfully implemented in a Science Education course session with 15 pre-service elementary science teachers. The participants evaluated the CLAIS system through mixed methods surveys as teachers, learners, peers, and users. Quantitative data showed that the participants' Intelligent-Technological, Pedagogical, And Content Knowledge was significantly increased after the CLAIS session, the perception of the CLAIS learning experience was positive, the peer assessment on AI speakers and human peers was different, and the user experience was ambivalent. Qualitative data showed that the participants anticipated future changes in the epistemic process in science classrooms, while acknowledging technical issues such as speech recognition performance and response latency. This study highlights the potential of Human-AI Collaboration for knowledge co-construction in authentic classroom settings and exemplify how AI could shape the future landscape of epistemic practices in the classroom.

When humans invented the concept of AI years ago, the end goal was to stimulate human-like intelligence. Little did they know that AI would turn out to be a breakthrough in the realm of technology. When a non-techie is subjected to the word "AI", his thought goes straight to digital assistants like Siri, Google Maps, a chatbot they conversed with while ordering food online, or even self-driving cars like Tesla. What they fail to understand is that AI goes way beyond that. From helping in fraud detection to diagnosing symptoms of some deadly illness, AI does not leave any stone unturned in helping mankind.

It began room deliveries of bottled water, towels and other amenities at guests' voice command or via touch screen orders, in December last year. KT will seek to further commercialize opportunities through its AI robots and to expand their usage to other industries. It expects users will especially appreciate the robots amid efforts to reduce in-person service contact during the COVID-19 pandemic. KT's head of AI business Kim Chae-Hee said, "KT will try to help our customers enjoy greater convenience in their everyday lives by applying AI robot services in a wider variety of areas beyond hotels, including food and beverages and office operations." Linked to an AI speaker, N Bot is capable of seamless service to local and foreign guests, from order to delivery.

SK Telecom has completed the development of the smart braille educating system running on its Nugu voice-activated artificial intelligence (AI) speaker to help the visually impaired learn braille much more easily, the company said Monday. The nation's top mobile carrier has cooperated with Ohfa Tech, a developer of the braille teaching device, Taptilo. The telecom company will offer 110 devices to schools for the blind and households within the month and verify the effectiveness of the system in cooperation with Kangnam University. The number of people who are visually impaired is estimated at about 300,000 in Korea, and 95 percent of these people are not able to read braille due to the shortage of specialist teachers, according to SK Telecom. The development of the braille educating system utilizing the AI speaker is expected to lower barriers to education for the visually impaired through innovative technology, it said.

With Harman International by its side, Samsung is preparing to enter the smart speaker market by creating a device that's sporting a more advanced artificial intelligence technology. The smart speaker Samsung is launching could even be running on an AI platform that's better than Amazon's Alexa and Google's Google Assistant. Last Friday, Harman International CEO Dinesh Paliwal spoke with The Korea Herald after a private meeting with Samsung Electronics President and CEO Yoon Boo-keun and other distributors and business partners. Though the half-hour meeting was a closed-door event, Paliwal divulged to the publication that among the topics they discussed at the gathering was the ongoing collaboration between the two companies as they work on Samsung's smart speaker. Paliwal also admitted that the two firms will be doing extensive research and development for the AI device.

Xiaomi's Mi division, which sells some accessories in the US but still no phones, is getting into smart speakers. It just unveiled the Mi AI Speaker, its equivalent to Amazon's Alexa, Google Home and other personal assistant-type models. However, it play music and take voice commands for a lot less, costing just 299 RMB or around $45 when it hits shelves in China starting next month. It features "high-quality" sound and a six microphone array to detect voice commands from any direction and distance like its rivals. More importantly, it has artificial intelligence built-in, so you can order it to play streaming music and act as a personal assistant, giving you weather, calendar reminders, news and so on.

Major tech firms have been keen to sell speakers equipped with voice-based artificial intelligence agents recently. The debuts of smart speakers are seen as the prelude to an AI era, ushering in a new technological age in which virtual assistants are expected to become as ubiquitous as the smartphone, allowing people to connect to the internet by voice with greater ease. Whether these speakers will really take off and whether the technology will be popular in Japan remain to be seen. The following are answers to these questions as well as why AI speakers are creating a buzz and what will be the role of Japanese firms in this field. What makes AI speakers special?

Google has launched its voice-activated Wi-Fi speaker, Google Home, in the UK. The device, around the size of a pint glass, can respond to questions, play music and control smart home technology, all by using speech recognition. The device is a challenger to the Echo, Amazon's smart speaker, which went on sale in the UK last year. The Echo has been seen as a pioneer but Google, which sees itself as a leader in voice recognition and artificial intelligence, hopes its software will give it an edge. The Google Home, which will cost £129 and go on sale next Thursday, April 6, runs Google Assistant, the same virtual assistant software that features on the Google Pixel phone, and is activated by speaking the words "OK Google", followed by a command.