In this photo illustration Facebook logo can be seen, Kolkata, India, 28 February, 2020. Facebook ... [ ] Inc on Thursday announced its decision to cancel its annual developer conference due to Coronavirus outbreak according a news media report. Some crisis situations are caused by what people say or do. On occasion, a crisis--or an embarrassing incident--is caused by technology. The New York Times reported yesterday that, "Facebook users who recently watched a video from a British tabloid featuring Black men saw an automated prompt from the social network that asked if they would like to'keep seeing videos about Primates', causing the company to investigate and disable the artificial intelligence-powered feature that pushed the message. "This was clearly an unacceptable error and we disabled the entire topic recommendation feature as soon as we realized this was happening so we could investigate the cause and prevent this from happening again," Facebook spokeswoman Dani Lever said in a statement to USA Today. "As we have said, while we have made improvements to our AI, we know it's not perfect and we have more progress to make," she said. "We apologize to anyone who may have seen these offensive recommendations." This is not the first time that advanced technology has created an embarrassing situation for an organization. The Washington Post reported yesterday that "a judge ruled that Apple will have to continue fighting a lawsuit brought by users in federal court in California, alleging that the company's voice assistant Siri has improperly recorded private conversations." Last week at the Paralympics in Tokyo, Toyota self-driving pods injured a pedestrian. Reuters reported that, "In a YouTube video, Toyota Chief Executive Akio Toyoda apologized for the incident and said he offered to meet the person but was unable to do so.

Paris firefighters used drones and a water-spitting robot to help tame the Notre Dame Cathedral fire. Putting out Monday's fire at the famed Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris was a joint effort between hundreds of firefighters, emergency personnel and modern technology. Parisian firefighters used a combination of robots and drones to see, track and contain the blaze that ravaged the 800-year-old cathedral's roof, spire and stained glass windows. One instrumental player was Colossus, a water-firing robot that was deployed to quell the flames from inside the smoldering Gothic cathedral after firefighters were forced to evacuate certain areas. The tank-like robot, which was designed to transport equipment and wounded people, is equipped with cameras that allow the person who's operating it to see what's happening within danger zones.

An 1,100-pound emergency robot helped to save a piece of human history during a blaze at Paris' Notre Dame cathedral that threatened to burn the historic monument to the ground. The formidable device, dubbed Colossus, a remote-controlled drone equipped with hoses and cameras, was able to roll its way into the cathedral to help fight the fire -- which burned through the structure's old wooden roof -- from within. Colossus, which is both fire-resistant, water-proof, and capable of carrying up to 1,200 pounds not only helped to stop the fire before it completely razed the structure, but reduced the need for fire fighters to enter the church where they would be in danger from falling debris. At the time, the cathedral was only 15 to 30 minutes away from being completely burned to the ground, reports say. Weighing in at 1,100 pounds, Colossus is a firefighting robot that can be controlled remotely.

As Notre Dame Cathedral's majestic spire tumbled into the inferno on Monday night, live newsreaders around the world decried the tragic loss of this 12th-century marvel. The great timber roof – nicknamed "the forest" for the thousands of trees used in its beams – was gone, the rose windows feared melted, the heart of Paris destroyed forever. What few realised in the heat of the shocking footage was that much of what was ablaze was a 19th-century fantasy. Like most buildings of this age, Notre Dame is the sum of centuries of restorations and reinventions, a muddled patchwork of myth and speculation. Standing as a sturdy hulk on the banks of the Seine, the great stone pile has never been the most elegant or commanding of the ancient cathedrals, but it became the most famous. Begun in 1163, it was larger than any gothic church before it, employing some of the first flying buttresses to allow taller, thinner walls and larger expanses of glazing – including the spectacular rose windows that projected great cosmic wheels of colour into the luminous interior. "Where would [one] find … such magnificence and perfection, so high, so large, so strong, clothed round about with such a multiple variety of ornaments?"