artificial intelligence - page 5

Siri’s starting work — or at least something like that. SRI International, the brains behind the Siri standalone app bought by Apple back in 2010, has announced the creation of Kasisto, a business version of Apple’s virtual assistant.

Kasisto will enable companies to integrate their own branded Siri-style assistants within apps, providing a way of letting helping consumers navigate complex tasks through a conversational Artificial Intelligence program. While SRI International has yet to release many details, this means that it should be possible to harness the regular Siri interactions for more specialized tasks within apps, allowing specific businesses to “train” their own version of Siri to become an expert in a variety of areas, from medical advice to, say, movie rentals.

Successful apps create a beautiful experience and look that all users will love. Victoricon icons allow you to do just that! Add clean and stimulating icons to your app to provide a large amount of info in a tiny space.

With more than 1600 vector icons are available, you won’t be able to find a category you don’t have an icon for. The collection includes 5 different sizes and 8 different formats for each icon so you won’t skip a beat. And Cult of Mac Deals has got a special price for all of this…only $19 during this limited time offer!

Google has beaten out Facebook to acquire London-based Artificial Intelligence company DeepMind — for an amount alleged to be in excess of $500 million.

DeepMind was founded by neuroscientist and chess prodigy Demis Hassabis, as well as Skype and Kazaa developer Jaan Tallin, and researcher Shane Legg. While it is unknown exactly what the company is working on, it describes itself as a “a cutting edge artificial intelligence company” to build general-purpose learning algorithms for simulations, e-commerce, and games.

LAS VEGAS — Remember Anki, the little iOS-powered toy car app that Apple brought up on stage for its World Wide Developers Conference last year?

We got to catch up with them at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show to talk about the app, the AI-controlled toy cars, and how they’ve created the latest must-have toy gadget with Apple’s help.

You can never have enough tools in your designer toolbox, and Cult of Mac Deals has assembled another deal that will allow you to add even more high-quality design elements to yours.

With The Professionally-Designed Web Icon Set you’ll get thousands of icons and pictograms at a fraction of the regular price — just $49. That’s a savings of 85%!

This icon bundle includes Pictograms, Stock Icons and Mini Icons. All are modern in design and available in various PNG sizes. Here’s what you’ll get in this package (Note: Visit the Deals page to view samples of each of the sets included in this bundle):

• Application Toolbar Icons: PNG Format; 24, 32, 48px sizes
• Business Icon Set: PNG Format; 24, 48, 64, 128px sizes
• Colored Mini Icon Set: PNG Format; 16px size
• Country Flags Icon Set: PNG, PSD Format; 16 – 512px sizes
• Credit Cards Icon Set: PNG Format; 32, 48, 64px sizes
• Food Icon Set: PNG Format; 48px size
• Hand-Drawn Sketch Icon Set: PNG Format; 48px size
• Minimal Vector Mini Icon Set: PNG, PSD Format; 16px size
• Mobile Application Icon Set: PNG Format; 48, 64, 90px sizes
• Outline Style Pictogram Set: PNG, PSD Format; 24 – 512px sizes
• Pictograms Glyphs Icon Set: PNG, PSD Format; 16 – 512px sizes
• Portfolio Icon Set: PNG Format; 24, 48, 64, 128px sizes
• Social Media Glyphs Icon Set: PNG, AI Format; 16 – 512px sizes
• Social Media Icon Set: PNG Format; 48px size
• Status Icon Set: PNG Format; 24, 48, 64px sizes
• Stroke Icons: PNG, PSD Format; 16 – 512px sizes
• Transportation Icon Set: PNG Format; 32, 48, 64, 76px sizes
• Weather Icon Set: PNG Format; 32, 64, 128px sizes
• Web Browser Icon Set: PNG Format; 16, 32, 64, 128px sizes

(Note: You’ll need Adobe Photoshop CS5 or higher and Adobe Illustrator CS5 or higher to make use of these icons and pictograms.)

Whether you’re creating a website, application, or wireframe for a client or personal use, adding these professionally designed, high-quality, and royalty-free stock icons to your collection may just be the best thing you do all week. So pick up The Professionally-Designed Web Icon Set for only $49 from Cult of Mac Deals today!

Finding stuff on the web is pretty easy. Finding stuff you don’t already know about, surprising stuff, is hard. That’s what the developers behind Trapit are trying to fix.

Trapit for iPad allows you to discover things you’re already interested in as well as stuff you may not even know you’re looking for using algorithms that run in the app behind the scenes. What that means is that once you start using Trapit, it will learn what you’re into, and start finding stuff that might be of interest to you, based on what you’re already checking out as well as new stuff that might be cool for you to see.

The app also curates its own content into a Featured Traps section, which will help you discover even more content for that surprise factor.

The popularity of Babak Pahlavan‘s new predictive, artificial intelligence app seems to have caught him completely by surprise; so much so that he had to change its (or maybe in this case, his) name from Seymour to Alfred.

The latest MacBooks (including the Pro and the new Airs) have been understandably criticized for their anachronistic adherence to Intel’s last-gen Core 2 Duo CPU when competing notebooks have all moved on to the superior Arrandale architecture.

There’s a good reason for that, though: a lawsuit between Intel and GPU maker NVIDIA that prevents the latter company from making chipsets for current-gen Intel CPUs that include an NVIDIA memory controller. That lawsuit may be on the cusp of being resolved.

French software development company Visuamobile is planning to launch an iPhone app called  ELIZA AI, based on the 1966 artificial intelligence computer program trained to respond to questions like a therapist, that is by asking other questions.

Though the program is dated, Leca says the Eliza iPhone app still had the same effect that surprised creator Joseph Weizenbaum back at MIT in the day — at a certain point people forget  ELIZA is not  a human therapist.

“What seemed really interesting, and I have tested it at the office, is that people are reluctant to show you what they have been discussing with Eliza,” Dominique Leca of  Visuamobile told Cult of Mac. Leca, who handles business development at the Paris-based company,  had the idea for the app. “And, to tell you the truth, Eliza has helped me several times. The fact that she constantly asks you to explain yourself is a great way to analyze what you think.”

Set to be released for free download on the visuamobile store on iTunes March 3, Leca said the Eliza app will likely remain gratis but the company has more sophisticated psyched-up apps in the works, like one based on AI chat robot ALICE, that will probably be fee-based.

Assisted navel-gazing anyone?

Images courtesy visuamobile