The number of people of all ages who are visually impaired is estimated to be 285 million globally, of whom 39 million are blind. In an effort to provide assistance where it can, Microsoft in 2016 launched Project Tokyo, a partnership among researchers in the U.S., U.K., China, Japan, and India to explore technologies that might help those with impairments interact with the world around them. Four…
Google’s AI powers real-time orca tracking in Vancouver Bay
January 29, 2020
Google AI today shared that it’s created a model for detecting an endangered species of orca whales in the Salish Sea, a waterway between the United States and Canada. Underwater microphones situated at a dozen points in the Salish Sea that includes the state of Washington…
Roughly a year ago, Google open-sourced MediaPipe, a framework for building cross-platform AI pipelines consisting of fast inference and media processing (like video decoding). Basically, it’s a quick and dirty way to perform object detection, face detection, hand…
Meena is Google’s attempt at making true conversational AI
January 29, 2020
Conversational AI is a catch-all term for natural language models for artificial intelligence that can interpret human words, speak to people, or carry out tasks or computation with natural language.
But talk to any of the best-known AI assistants today — Alexa, Siri, Google Assistant — and they’re not exactly conversational. They can tell you jokes, answer factual questions, and even…
VentureBeat’s Tech Showcase is back at Transform 2020: Accelerating your business with AI, July 15-16 in San Francisco. We’re on the lookout for disruptive AI companies of all sizes that are ready to present their tech on the main stage.
Those selected to present will do…
AI Weekly: Calls for facial recognition moratorium highlight need for protection from surveillance tech
January 29, 2020
The debate over whether to ban or place moratoriums on the use of facial recognition started last year in cities like San Francisco, but the debate reignited this week when Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai said he’s open to a moratorium on facial recognition.
“It…
The Pokémon Company and Nintendo announced today that Pokémon Home will launch in February for Android, iOS, and Switch.
Pokémon Home is an app that will make it easier for fans of the monster-collecting franchise to store, trade, and transfer Pokémon among different games. With the mobile version, players can have access to their critters from Pokémon Go, although support for that game…
Red Dead Redemption 2 approaches 35 million copies sold
January 29, 2020
Rockstar Games had an OK decade, I guess. At least, for a studio that only had a handful of major releases. But two of those games, Grand Theft Auto V and Red Dead Redemption 2, are among the best-selling games over the last 10 years. And now, Rockstar is highlighting some…
The second-half of 2019 saw Anker release several compelling charging solutions for today’s modern devices. We recently went hands-on with the brand’s 100W PowerPort Atom PD 4, which is arguably the best charger on the market in 2020. However, today we’re looking at…
Activision Blizzard and Google are getting into a far-reaching partnership that covers multiple facets of the publisher’s gaming business. Google Cloud will act as the “preferred partner” for hosting Activision Blizzard games. YouTube, meanwhile, will act as the broadcast home for Activision Blizzard’s live esports. That includes Overwatch League, Call of Duty League, Hearthstone, and…
