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Alexa is smart, feature-rich, and pretty innovative, but it has trouble spots, particularly with differentiating different voices to respond to. That may change soon. Amazon is reportedly developing an advanced voice-recognition feature that will allow Alexa to tell different voices apart, according to sources familiar with Amazon’s Alexa strategy. Will Alexa Be Able To Tell Voices Apart Soon? The report comes from Time. Alexa, like many virtual assistant, […]

Kim Smith was not given terms and conditions when her employer offered her a fitness tracker last year. The 27-year-old, who holds a junior position in a big media company, entered data such as how much water she drank and her weight on the GPS-enabled device. The number of steps she — and her colleagues who joined the programme — took each day were recorded on a […]

By Se Young Lee and Ju-min Park | SEOUL SEOUL South Korean prosecutors said on Tuesday they will charge Samsung Group chief Jay Y. Lee with bribery and embezzlement as the top conglomerate announced the dismantling of its corporate strategy office, the latest developments in a scandal that has rocked the country for months. Jay Y. Lee, 48, was arrested on Feb. 17 over his alleged role […]

By 2019, 77 percent of businesses in Australia will have embraced the Internet of Things (IoT) in some form, according to a study by Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company. In its latest study, The Internet of Things: Today and Tomorrow, Aruba said the remaining 13 percent of Australian organisations are currently not thinking about an IoT strategy, with approximately 8 percent of those surveyed still unclear […]

LONDON The “sheer intransigence” of the British government over Brexit could lead to a second Scottish independence referendum, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said on Tuesday, warning time was running out for the country to change course. Writing in the Times newspaper, Sturgeon said Britain’s vote to leave the European Union had changed the landscape since Scotland last held a referendum on its independence, voting by a 10-point […]

By Joseph Sipalan | KUALA LUMPUR KUALA LUMPUR Two women – an Indonesian and a Vietnamese – will be charged with murder on Wednesday over their alleged involvement in the killing of the estranged half-brother of North Korea’s leader at Kuala Lumpur’s main airport, Malaysia’s attorney general said. Police have said that the women smeared VX nerve agent, a chemical on a U.N. list of weapons of […]

BANGKOK A top official in Thailand’s palace has been fired for “extremely evil” misconduct and political interests which threatened national security, the government said on Tuesday. Police General Jumpol Manmai, who had served as intelligence chief under ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, had until recently been one of the most senior figures in new King Maha Vajiralongkorn’s household. The government said in a statement Jumpol had […]

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Thousands of ants converge to follow the most direct path from their colony to their food and back. A swarm of inexpensive, unmanned drones quickly map an offshore oil spill. What could these events have in common? Each extremely complex task is accomplished by individuals following very simple rules. But to make the drones do it, a bit of nature’s magic must be captured in a […]

BEIJING China plans to target broad money supply growth of around 12 percent in 2017, slightly lower than last year’s goal, policy sources said, signaling a bid to contain debt risks while keeping growth on track. Under its new “prudent and neutral” policy, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has adopted a modest tightening bias in a bid to cool torrid credit expansion, though it is treading […]

Rumors have been circulating recently about a looming expansion for Hearthstone following the major Gadgetzan update late last year. The leaks have cited the so-called The Lost Secrets of Un’Goro update and Blizzard has officially confirmed it last Feb. 27. The publisher, however, announced a slightly different title, which is Journey to Un’Goro. Ancient Jungle Essentially, Un’Goro is purportedly an ancient jungle teeming with primordial wonders. So you can expect […]

Early last year Olivier Leprêtre signed a new lease on a €2.7m fishing boat. Then the UK voted to leave the EU — and the trawlerman from Boulogne-sur-Mer on the other side of the Channel is already regretting his decision. “If I’d known Brexit would happen, I never would have signed,” he says, gesturing towards the British coastline just 50km away. “It could crush us.” His fears […]

A voracious thirst for petroleum makes the US one of the largest importers of oil. But for the past two weeks it has also scaled the ranks of exporters. Outbound shipments of crude have surpassed 1.2m barrels a day, more than last month’s daily production of Algeria, Ecuador or Qatar, each a member of Opec.  The foreign sales underscore how the US has become more integrated into […]

The Australian government has told the Senate Economics References Committee that the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) will subject its forthcoming policy and procedural changes to an independent Privacy Impact Assessment and “broad consultation” before implementing them in response to the 2016 Census debacle. One such change, however, will not include allowing citizens to omit their names from Census forms, with the government holding firm that it […]

BEIJING China cemented President Xi Jinping’s position as the “core” of the Communist Party on Monday, making it part of ideological teaching in colleges and universities as Beijing tightens its hold on education. Political thought and party leadership in China’s places of higher learning should “closely revolve around the Chinese Communist Party with comrade Xi Jinping at the core”, the State Council, China’s Cabinet, said in a […]

BEIJING Chinese state media has reacted with anger and threats of boycotts after the board of an affiliate of South Korea’s Lotte Group approved a land swap with the government that will enable authorities to deploy a U.S. missile defence system. The government decided last year to deploy the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system, in response to the North Korean missile threat, on land […]

A special structure for storing energy known as a supercapacitor has been constructed in a plant for the first time. The plant, a rose, can be charged and discharged hundreds of times. (via WSJ)

KUALA LUMPUR Malaysia’s police chief said on Tuesday police were aware of two North Korea-linked companies that were identified in a Reuters report as firms operating an arms business in the Southeast Asian country. Khalid Abu Bakar said the two companies, International Global System and International Golden Services, were in the process of being “struck off”. “We have also taken all necessary actions to comply with international […]

SHANGHAI An undisclosed buyer has placed the largest overseas order for China’s home-developed military drones, the Xinhua news agency has reported, in a boost for the Chinese arms industry’s efforts to increase export volumes. The order for the Wing Loong II was placed before the next-generation unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) successfully completed its maiden flight, Xinhua said late on Monday, citing the system’s developer Chengdu Aircraft Design […]

By Steve Holland | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON President Donald Trump is seeking what he called a “historic” increase in defense spending, but ran into immediate opposition from Republicans in Congress who must approve his plan and said it was not enough to meet the military’s needs. The proposed rise in the Pentagon budget to $603 billion comes as the United States has wound down major wars in Iraq […]

LG opened Mobile World Congress 2017 with its latest flagship smartphone, the LG G6. All four major U.S. carriers have announced the handset will see a release on their networks and when you can expect it to go on sale. LG Launches 5.7-Inch LG G6 Mobile World Congress 2017 has just kicked off and as expected, LG officially showed off the LG G6 to the world. The […]

SoftBank is leading efforts to consolidate the space technology sector with talks to merge OneWeb, the US satellite start-up it backs, with Intelsat, one of the world’s largest commercial satellite operators. Bonds sold by Intelsat surged on Monday after it was reported that the deeply indebted satellite operator was nearing a deal with SoftBank to merge with OneWeb, which raised $1.2bn from the Japanese group and other investors in December. […]

Chinese companies have borrowed more money from the international bond market than from domestic investors so far this year, breaking with tradition as authorities in Beijing focus on curbing capital outflows. Banks and other corporate borrowers have been quietly encouraged to raise money offshore in other currencies, limiting the need for Chinese companies to sell renminbi to finance overseas investments. Borrowing more outside the mainland also allows […]

BEIJING A youth named by China as the second-highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism, but reviled as a fake by many Tibetans, has praised the Communist Party’s religious policies in Tibet in a lunar new year message, saying they made him feel “very happy”. Although officially atheist, China selected Gyaltsen Norbu as the 11th Panchen Lama in 1995 in a drive to win the hearts and minds of […]

Light introduced through an optical fiber can determine whether a patient’s blood is coagulating by measuring the vibration of red blood cells. Credit: Andrii Pshenychnyi A University of Central Florida professor has invented a way to use light to continuously monitor a surgical patient’s blood, for the first time providing a real-time status during life-and-death operations. The technology developed by UCF scientist Aristide Dogariu uses an optical […]

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