In what has become a recurring exercise, Google recently staged a product announcement event just weeks after Apple’s media event revealed the iPhone 7, Apple Watch Series 2, and AirPods. As with a previous such event (see “Google I/O 2016 Includes Announcements with Apple Appeal,” 23 May 2016), much of what Google showed off has

Kirobo Mini: Technological imaginary friends Technology may have invaded the realm of imaginary friends. Lonely kids will not have to dream up their imaginary friends because they can have one that really talks back for about 400 US Dollars. There’s a little robot companion named Kirobo Mini and it comes from an unlikely source—Toyota. Think

When Google Allo first premiered, people were actually most impressed – not by the messaging platform’s features, which were lacking – but by the Google Assistant companion that accompanied it. It was the first glimpse we got of an entity that’s slated to reside not only in Allo, but also in Google Home and Pixel

 This article is part of the Bots Channel. You can view a high-resolution version of the landscape here.   Speak to some bot creators and they will tell you that they’re willing to jump through the hoops of building and submitting an app to Apple in order to join the iMessage App Store. It is possible

Artificial intelligence, in practice, isn’t very funny. Ask Siri or Amazon Alexa to tell you a joke, and you’ll probably get something a 10-year-old would scrunch her nose at. Google wants to change that. The company unveiled Google Home, its Amazon Echo-like home assistant, last week. According to the Wall Street Journal, Google hired writers

On this episode of The Cybersecurity Podcast, New America’s Peter Singer and Passcode’s Sara Sorcher interview Thomas Rid, a war studies professor at King’s College, about his new book, “Rise of the Machines: A Cybernetic History.” October 11, 2016 —As technology advances, computers are smarter than ever: They can understand human speech and even drive cars. But