Canada ends its three year Universal Basic Income trial two years early
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Governments fear the fall out from the mass automation of jobs by AI will be extreme so they’re investigating new welfare systems to limit the damage, but solutions are illusive. 4,000 people in Ontario, Canada just lost their Universal Basic Income (UBI) cash and...
Ocado shows off the world’s most advanced automated warehouse
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As technology and robotics get better it won’t be long before all warehouses are completely automated. They call it “The Hive,” or “The Grid.” Or sometimes just: “The machine.” It’s a huge structure that fills a warehouse on the outskirts of Andover, a small...
AI recruiters are using advanced surveillance like tech to interview job seekers
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The same technologies that are helping us catch and profile criminals, or surveil civilians at scale, AI, biometrics, machine vision and so on, are also helping companies find, interview, analyse and categorise job seekers faster and more effectively than ever. Companies, like RBS and...
EU law makers are thinking of letting people sue robots
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As automation, in the form of autonomous hardware and software based robots, becomes more commonplace, law makers are debating who should be responsible for their actions. If a robot, acting autonomously, injures or otherwise wrongs a human, who will be held responsible? Some European...
Slow human co-workers get Flippy the burger flipping robot fired
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As the world continues to embrace automation one of the biggest problems could be figuring out the best way for robots and humans to work together. After debuting to much fanfare last year Flippy the burger flipping robot, made by Miso Robotics, who was...
Futurist keynote, Milton Keynes: The Future of Communities, Castleton European Summit
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The future will have a huge impact on the future of communities, both good and bad, but with proper foresight and planning tomorrow’s communities could be brighter and better for everyone. Firstly, I’d like to thank Jay and Chantel for inviting me to present...
Vertical farms edge closer to disrupting traditional agriculture
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Today’s modern agricultural practises favour countries with fertile land and the food they produce has a dramatic impact on the environment, but tomorrows farms could be stationed in deserts, or at sea, right next to their consumers, producing high quality, organic food at knock down...
Las Vegas goes high tech with cocktail mixing robots
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The resent resurgence in interest in the field of robotics means we are now seeing more robots appearing in more places taking on more tasks. Las Vegas who recently met its goal to be 100 percent powered by renewable energy is full of dazzling...
JPMorgan is automating the world of finance
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The world of finance is being automated faster than almost any other industry and JPMorgan is leading the charge. At JPMorgan Chase a learning machine is parsing financial deals that once kept legal teams busy for thousands of hours. The program, called COIN, for...
US DoE wants to use AI to build world’s first autonomous energy grid
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Being able to fully automate the American energy grid could reduce regulatory burden, improve resilience and reliability, and make it more efficient. The US Department of Energy, whose supercomputers are already building their own AI’s, has announced it will explore a first of a...
AI drones will soon be controlling autonomous vehicles on building sites
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Automation is a fact of life within every industry now, but as technology advances more tasks will be able to be automated, and in the construction industry this is one of the first, major steps to full automation. Some mining operations are already 100...
Israeli Robo-Lawyer trashes top US lawyers in head to head competition
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Today we have contracts for everything it seems, and on top of that lawyers are expensive, and not everyone has access to them, Robo-Lawyer AI’s are helping democratise law and change that paradigm. Lawyers are pretty good at law-related activities, after all, it’s their...
IBM’s “flying brain” Watson heads into space
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As the space industry steps looks to explore more space and even colonise and mine new planets the demands on astronauts is increasing, so CIMON and its descendents will be used to help lighten their load and make them more productive. IBM Watson is...
Finland evaluates the results of its Universal Basic Income experiment
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As automation threatens to make tens, if not hundreds, of millions of people redundant, governments are trialling new welfare schemes to support them, one of which is UBI. The rise of the robots, whether it’s hardware robots that are taking over more manufacturing jobs,...
British bank trials a life like digital Avatar to serve customers better
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Avatars and bots are getting more intelligent, and more capable, and while they are being increasingly deployed to help organisations improve customer service, there’s a very real toll on human jobs. This week the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), who recently started using brain...
As automation accelerates experts debate Universal Basic Income alternatives
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Increasingly sophisticated technologies are bringing about a new revolution in automation that threatens hundreds of millions of jobs, and if unemployment rises governments will need a way to support people who are affected. In Budapest last week a small crowd gathered to watch Steve Fuller,...
Lockheed will build America’s next generation of autonomous submarines
WHY THIS MATTERS It is inevitable that more of the world’s military platforms will become autonomous, and America’s submarines are about to get a huge upgrade. As part of its plan to turn undersea drones from remote controlled tools and toys into fully enrolled members of the fleet, last...
World first as drones and robots plant, tend and harvest their own crops
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF It was only a matter of time before robots autonomously grew and harvested their own crops, and now it’s happened. The Agricultural industry is going through a revolution, whether it’s thanks to organisations like DARPA who are formulating new genetic solutions that can re-vitalise...
Inside Amazons secret plan to crush retailers with AI fashion designers, stylists and on demand manufacturing
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Over the past year Amazon has assembled the technology it needs to crush retailers in a new way using AI fashion designers and stylists, new immersive reality platforms, and on demand manufacturing, and, in a move that could bring new pain to today’s retail communities,...
San Fransisco mulls introducing America’s first “Robot Tax”
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As the level of automation around the world increases governments are increasingly considering taxing robots, and, more specifically, machines that “automate” human jobs Artificial Intelligence (AI), robots and other Robotic Process Automation (RPA) tools are now handling more and more of the work that...
