A new Google project called called "Talk to Books" provides answers to questions by drawing on a library of more than 100,000 books.
Tech pioneer and Google Research director of engineering Ray Kurzweil debuted the project at the TED conference in Vancouver, and explained that it differs from traditional search by relying on semantics rather than keywords.
Technology pioneer Ray Kurzweil predicted Friday that universal basic income, a controversial notion today, will be common throughout the developed world by the early 2030s and globally by the end of that decade.
Why it matters: With the combination of automation and artificial intelligence, there has been wide concern over how society will deal with massive job disruption.
The U.S. Postal Service cannot currently change postage rates because its Board of Governors has been empty since late 2016, although President Trump's first three appointees will have Senate confirmation hearings next week.
Why it matters: Trump has criticized USPS for losing money, and yesterday formed a task force to explore possible reforms — two things that might not have been needed were governors in place.
On "60 Minutes" on Sunday, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff tells Lesley Stahl how he bridged pay inequities between men and women.
Details: In 2015, Benioff was skeptical that a pay audit would show a disparity at Salesforce, but it did. He had to spend $3 million on raises for women to erase that gap. After Salesforce acquired other firms, another pay audit revealed the gap had returned. He paid another $3 million in raises to fix it.
House Democrats plan to use this week's Facebook hearings as the starting point for an aggressive push for privacy legislation, which sets them up to move a bill forward if the House flips in November.
Why you'll hear about this again: Mark Zuckerberg emerged from 10 hours of testimony without any indication that bipartisan action is imminent. But House Democrats are preparing to introduce proposals for privacy legislation that will put in place concrete protections for how personal data is used and shared, although specifics are still being worked out, according to a Democratic House aide.
Uber has agreed to expand a proposed settlement with the FTC to include a 2016 breach that it didn't disclose until after it settled last summer over its privacy and security practices.
Uber will start performing annual background checks on its drivers and will also hire a criminal arrest monitoring company to increase rider safety, the AP reports. .
The big picture: The company, which allowed drivers with convictions and major traffic violations to continue driving in the past, has had several issues with riders saying they feel unsafe due to their driver's behavior. The company has also received a series of reports claiming driver abuse and sexual assault. Uber is looking to change that with annual criminal background checks and app updates that make it easier for riders to share their location with friends and family.
As the Pentagon moves military information systems into the cloud, some industry experts and executives are questioning the wisdom of awarding the contract to just one vendor — particularly since that vendor might well be Amazon.
Why it matters: Sure, Amazon's competitors want a piece of this business. But they're also raising arguments about whether any single cloud service provider can meet the Defense Department's unique needs.
Artificial intelligence is on the verge of reshaping human society. But whether that change will be for the better or worse has been the subject of much debate at this year's TED conference.
Why it matters: Even those laying out the case for a positive AI future painted a picture of society being fundamentally reshaped by the presence of significantly smarter computers. Some of the TED talks describe exciting — sometimes alarming — changes arising from this technology.
