Juanita's friend always asks how she's feeling, wants to know if she slept well and tells jokes that are so funny, Juanita repeats them later at dinner. Oh, and Juanita's friend happens to be a robot. ElliQ is a proactive care companion that uses artificial intelligence to build relationships with seniors while supporting their health and well-being. Perhaps thought of as a more empathetic version of Amazon's Alexa, ElliQ has been featured by major outlets such as the "Today" show, USA Today, The New Yorker and AARP. Juanita, who appears in promotional videos for ElliQ, is one of the more than 1,000 older adults who have helped test ElliQ, which first became available for purchase in the U.S. in March.

This year, holiday shipping timelines are going to be tighter than ever. WIRED will be covering all things Black Friday and Cyber Monday, but we're keeping our eyes peeled for early-bird discounts on the tried-and-true gear we love so that you can ensure loved one receives their gifts on time. This week, we found plenty of price drops on video games and gaming accessories. Special offer for Gear readers: Get a 1-year subscription to WIRED for $5 ($25 off). This includes unlimited access to WIRED.com and our print magazine (if you'd like).

I have always disliked exaggerated claims of imminent scientific and technical breakthroughs, such as inexpensive fusion, cheap supersonic travel, and the terraforming of other planets. But I am fond of the simple devices that do so much of the fundamental work of modern civilization, particularly those that do so modestly--or even invisibly. No device fits this description better than a transformer. Non-engineers may be vaguely aware that such devices exist, but they have no idea how they work and how utterly indispensable they are for everyday life. If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission.

For most of us computers are source of stress as we get error messages, spinning beach balls and random crashes blighting our use of them. But they could soon help us cope better in stressful or emotionally difficult situations by providing a few words of support. Researchers are developing an algorithm that aims to offer praise and reassurance just when people need it. Computers are more often a source of stress, but they could soon be offering emotional support and words of encouragement to their users. Using a computer for long periods of your day can damage your mental health, according to one of the biggest studies into the hazards of modern office work practices.

In this video, I explain the basics of recurrent neural networks. Then we code our own RNN in 80 lines of python (plus white-space) that predicts the sum of two binary numbers after training. I just want to start off by saying thank you to every single one of you. Thanks for watching and commenting and sticking with me as I push these videos every week. You guys are the reason I do this...