Amazon scientists are prototyping algorithms that use crowdsourcing to identify product data, the company reports in a blog post. The researchers believe these algorithms could be used to predict human judgments of product quality on Amazon, which might improve people’s shopping experience by matching only high-quality products to search queries.
The work is something of a follow-up to a study…
A preprint paper coauthored by scientists at Facebook AI Research describes Rewarding Impact-Driven Exploration (RIDE), an intrinsic reward method that encourages AI-driven agents to take actions in an environment. The researchers say that it outperforms state-of-the-art…
Israel’s Toya creates social games for girls on Roblox
March 11, 2020
Toya is a game studio that makes social games on top of Roblox, but it is different because it is making games with girls and women in mind.
Roblox has 115 million monthly active players, and people engage with it more than 1.5 billion hours a month. The top games are…
Twenty years ago, I remember interviewing Joe Kucan, an emerging star of video game acting, for his role as the villainous Kane of Command & Conquer. His bald head and mean face epitomized why the player had to save the world from this evil.
And now he’s coming back. Kane and all of his vivid video game cinematics will be available in Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection, which…
Blockchain Game Partners is building a blockchain-based infrastructure dubbed Gala to enable games where players own their own content and platforms don’t fleece developers for the games that they create.
It’s the brainchild of Eric Schiermeyer, the founder and CEO of…
Microsoft researchers create AI ethics checklist with ML practitioners from a dozen tech companies
March 11, 2020
While speaking on a panel recently, Landing AI founder and Google Brain cofounder Andrew Ng described a moment when he read the OECD’s AI ethics principles to an engineer, and the engineer told him the words give no instruction on how he should change how he does his…
The next Nintendo Direct is in the works. The publisher hasn’t confirmed the event yet, but it’s in the final stages of putting the video presentation together. That’s based on what we’re hearing as well as some other indicators. Expect a Nintendo Direct soon. The company is penciling in one of its indie showcases (like the one it released around GDC 2019) for next week — likely March…
UFC 248 is set for the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Saturday, March 7th at 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m. PT. Follow along for how to watch the fight on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, and more.
UFC fights are and you’ll need an ESPN+ subscription. For new customers, there’s a…
Google in recent months has expanded and simplified 2-step verification across first-party services. Security keys for Google Accounts can now be enrolled on Android and macOS.
The most notable expansion today is for mobile, with all Android 7.0 Nougat and newer devices…
Brazil’s Court decides Apple isn’t wrong on reducing iPhone performance due to battery issues
March 7, 2020
Apple continues to face problems around the world after it admitted to reducing the performance of iPhones with a worn-out battery. Last month, France fined Apple €25M ($28M) for the battery-management features, but some governments seem to think differently. In Brazil, judges decided that Apple isn’t wrong to limit the performance of the devices due to battery health.
As reported, the…