IT Executive news

• Should Microsoft release a successor to Surface 3?

  24-06-2016 22:07
  
  Microsoft will stop manufacturing Surface 3 by the end of the year, which raises a big question: Will there be a Surface 4?The company has declined to say whether a Surface 4 will ever be released. But Microsoft says it saw strong demand for the Surface 3 tablet PC, so releasing a successor seems like a no-brainer.But the PC market is challenged. Upgrades have slowed down to every five or six years, and tablet shipments -- with the exception of 2-in-1s -- are declining. PC makers are already rel
  
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• Facebook, Google dominate list of top 15 mobile apps

  24-06-2016 21:50
  
  Facebook and Google have a deepening duopoly of apps adult U.S. smartphone owners use, according to the most recent monthly "Mobile Metrix" report from web metrics company comScore. The two giants own and operate every one of the eight most popular apps, based on the number of adults who used them in May 2016. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• 10 great Steam Summer Sale game bundles that will save you even more money

  24-06-2016 21:16
  Finding the best dealsThe legendary Steam Summer Sale may have lost a tinge of its excitement when Valve shifted away from Daily Deals and Flash Sales, but it’s still the place to go when you want to pick up great PC games for rock-bottom prices. This year’sSteam Summer Picnic Saleis no different. The glorious, brand new Doom for 40 percent off! Half-Life 2 for just $2! It’s ridiculous—ridiculously great.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click her
  
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• IoT pioneer announces big contracts with the Department of State, energy leader ENGIE

  24-06-2016 21:15
  
  Internet of Things platform supplier C3 IoT this week announced two sweeping contracts, one with ENGIE, a huge energy company in Europe, the other with the U.S. Department of State, adding to the eight-year-old company’s roster of big IoT wins.
  The Department of State is said to have signed a multi-year deal valued up to $25 million to use C3 IoT’s enterprise application development platform for a global energy management initiative.  C3 IoT will enable the Department of State
  
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• Apple starts test run of Safari 10

  24-06-2016 21:15
  
  Apple has begun testing Safari 10 with developers running the 2014 and 2015 editions of macOS, preparing for a fall release of the updated browser to users of Yosemite and El Capitan.
  Safari 10 was introduced earlier this month as part of macOS Sierra, this year's operating system upgrade.
  Apple typically supports its newest browser on three editions of macOS: The latest version and its two predecessors. The now-current Safari 9, for example, receives updates, including security patches, on las
  
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• Gartner: The IT spending implications of Brexit

  24-06-2016 21:14
  
  The Brexit vote puts a drag on global IT spending, but the U.K. will see the worst impact, Gartner said in a new spending forecast.
  Gartner had predicted a rise in U.K. tech spending by 1.7% this year, for a total spend of $179.6 billion in U.S. dollars. But this forecast was before Thursday's decision by U.K. voters to leave the European Union.
  The Brexit vote lowers the 2016 U.K. spending estimate between 2% and 5%, moving it into negative territory, said Gartner Friday. It expects U.K. IT sp
  
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• Uber will guarantee fares upfront, but surge prices are here to stay

  24-06-2016 21:13
  
  Everyone hates Uber’s surge-pricing, except for Uber of course. Now the crazy-making lightning bolt that indicates you’re about to spend a fortune to get home is going away, replaced by a fare guarantee that tells you exactly what you’re going to pay for the ride. But that doesn’t mean the surge is gone.
  Uber’s new up-front fare feature, which is slowly rolling out for UberX rides in some U.S. cities and in India, is exactly like the pricing you already see for Ube
  
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• Oculus ditches controversial Rift headset DRM after triggering Internet uproar

  24-06-2016 21:13
  
  The war is over. The last bombs have all fallen. The soldiers have come back home, and we can all join hands in the street and sing Kumbaya until our voices give out. Oculus has officially removed its ill-considered DRM check from the Rift and preemptively brought this conflict to a close.
  Some background: A few weeks ago, Oculus quietly slipped in a DRM-check with only one purpose: Breaking a program called Revive, which wrapped Rift games to work on the HTC Vive. Revive survived—it mere
  
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• Google uses VR to bring Pride to living rooms, mobile screens

  24-06-2016 21:12
  
  Google is using virtual reality technology to bring LGBTQ Pride parades to people who want but can't attend one.
  Dubbing the project #prideforeveryone, Google is documenting Pride parades around the world and delivering them in an immersive experience to people's living rooms and virtual reality (VR) sets.
  "Pride is a time to celebrate who you are and who you love," the company wrote in a blog post. "In more than 70 countries, it's a crime to be gay. Even in countries with legal equality, many
  
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• Researchers steal data from a PC by controlling noise from fans

  24-06-2016 21:11
  Even the noise from your PC’s fans could be used to steal the data inside. Researchers in Israel have found a way to do just by hijacking the fans inside and manipulating the sounds they create.
  The research from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev shows how data could be stolen from “air-gapped” computers, which are not connected to the Internet.
  These air-gapped computers are isolated and typically contain the most sensitive information. To hack them, attackers typically
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Does Brexit matter to healthcare?

  24-06-2016 21:03
  
  So, the shoe has dropped. For those of us who thought Brexit was just another continental Europe thing and a storm in a teacup (like the Scottish referendum in 2014 which was an anticlimax), we woke up (or went to bed last night) to news of the people of Great Britain choosing to exit the EU.As the pundits and analysts start to unpack the implications, stocks take a beating, and the pound takes an – um – pounding, the rest of us have to ask ourselves only one question: Does Brexit ma
  
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• The 'summer of AI' is here, this startup chief says

  24-06-2016 20:41
  
  Artificial intelligence is still surrounded by an aura of mystery, and it would be tough to find a better illustration than the story in the news last week about a British grandmother who includes "please" and "thank you" in all her Google searches."Please translate these roman numerals mcmxcviii thank you," read the search request from May Ashworth that ultimately went viral when her grandson tweeted it on Twitter."I thought, well somebody's put it in, so you're thanking them," Ashworth reporte
  
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• How to run a family-owned business

  24-06-2016 19:25
  
  I’ve some really bad experiences with family-run businesses over the years. However, I also know that some of the best, and most-rewarding, companies to work for are family-owned. Donald Trump’s business, as big as it is, qualifies. So when I a got a call from Brittany Thomas (who is promoting a new book by Henry Hutcheson, president of Family Business USA, titled “Dirty Little Secrets of Family Business”) I agreed to do an interview because I figured I could learn someth
  
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• Roku's new universal Windows 10 app avoids Windows Phones

  24-06-2016 19:12
  
  Streaming set-top box maker Roku recently announced a brand new universal Windows platform (UWP) app for Windows 10. But just as we’ve seen with other companies, a Windows Phone version is nowhere in sight despite the “universal” name. Instead, the new Roku app is for laptops and tablets only. 
  In fact, Roku said it built the app working closely with Microsoft to create an app that was ideal for the larger screens that laptops and tablets offer. This is also the first Rok
  
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• A Raspberry Pi 3 competitor will boast an SSD storage slot

  24-06-2016 18:44
  
  You can't put SSDs on the Raspberry Pi 3, but a competitive board coming soon will have that option.The new MinnowMax Turbot Dual-E board will have an m.2 slot in which SSDs can be inserted. It's being made by ADI Engineering and will be released in the third quarter, according to a message on Twitter.The board's price wasn't immediately available.High-capacity SSD chips up to 512GB can be found on sites like NewEgg. But the MinnowMax board's SSD storage capacity will ultimately depend on the de
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Facebook COO launches Together Women Can campaign

  24-06-2016 17:54
  
  Lean In, an organization committed to offering women the ongoing inspiration and support to help them achieve their goals, has launched campaign called “Together Women Can” to spread awareness about the power of women supporting each other.
  Lean In and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said in an interview with ABC News that her greatest hope for this campaign is that “we recognize what is already happening, which is that women are supporting other women. We will celebrate women. W
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Facebook COO launches Together Woman Can campaign

  24-06-2016 17:54
  
  Lean In, an organization committed to offering women the ongoing inspiration and support to help them achieve their goals, has launched campaign called “Together Women Can” to spread awareness about the power of women supporting each other.
  Lean In and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said in an interview with ABC News that her greatest hope for this campaign is that “we recognize what is already happening, which is that women are supporting other women. We will celebrate women. W
  
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• Adblock Plus can't charge Axel Springer for whitelisting its ads

  24-06-2016 17:24
  Fed up with readers using ad blockers to access its content for free, German publishing giant Axel Springer won a free ride of its own in a court appeal on Friday.The publisher's lawyers have been trying to get ad blocking declared illegal in a series of suits against German software company Eyeo, set up by Till Faida and Wladimir Palant, the developer of Adblock Plus.Their efforts had been unsuccessful -- until Friday, when the Higher Regional Court of Cologne ruled that Eyeo could not charge t
  
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• The EU and US reportedly reach data-transfer deal

  24-06-2016 17:15
  The U.S. and the European Union have reportedly reached an agreement on the language of a key data transfer pact, including limits on U.S. surveillance.The revamped EU-U.S. Privacy Shield was sent to EU member states overnight, according to a report from Reuters. Privacy Shield would govern how multinational companies handle the private data of EU residents.Member states are expected to vote on the proposal in July, unnamed sources told Reuters. Representatives of the EU and the U.S. D
  
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• The Four P’s of Analytics

  24-06-2016 16:43
  
  Few fields change as fast as digital. New channels, new methods, new business models — and all of it demands new methods of measurement and analytics. As new technologies and practices disrupt the field, digital analytics practitioners adapt. In any given year, a few themes dominate, and right now, the topics dominating discussion at the enterprise digital analytics table are four P’s: prioritization, personalization, people and perspective.PrioritizationAnalysts face a supply and de
  
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• With Android apps inbound, Google preps a storage manager for Chrome OS

  24-06-2016 16:27
  
  When Google first rolled out Chromebooks, managing local storage was not a top priority. Even though early Chromebooks typically came with 16GB of onboard storage the whole point of Google's laptops was that everything existed online. But Chromebooks today have all sorts of offline functionality, and soon newer Chromebooks will be running Android apps from Google Play.
  To make it easier to see what’s going on with your local storage, Google is working on a new storage manager for Chromebo
  
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• Amazon's pricey Kindle Oasis is worth the cost, if ...

  24-06-2016 16:25
  
  Kindle Voyage was Amazon's thinnest, lightest ereader when the company released it in October 2014. At the time, I owned a first-generation Kindle Paperwhite and was perfectly satisfied with it.
  However, when a "thinner" and "lighter" device is dangled in front of me, I quickly become destabilized. I was able to resist the temptation to buy a Voyage, which, at a minimum price of $200, seemed too expensive.
  Then, Amazon in April announced Kindle Oasis, which is even thinner and lighter
  
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• 54% off Vansky Bias Lighting for HDTV USB LED Multi Color Strip Accent Lighting - Deal Alert

  24-06-2016 16:13
  
  This bias lighting strip, currently discounted by 54% on Amazon from $49.99 down to just $22.99, reduces eye-strain caused by differences in picture brightness from scene to scene in movies, shows and games, by adding a subtle backlight to your monitor or TV.  The LED lights can be changed with up to 20 color selections customizing and setting the mood of your workspace. The strip is easy to install and can be cut to size and plugs directly in the USB port of the TV or monitor.  Just P
  
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• Samen tegen schaduw-IT

  24-06-2016 16:11
  Door Peter van Leest – Natuurlijk heb je in je organisatie een beveiligingsbeleid. Maar weet iedereen dat ook? De meeste werknemers willen gewoon hun werk kunnen doen – of dat altijd strookt met de regels vinden mensen vaak veel minder interessant.Schaduw-IT ontstaat op het moment dat werknemers het idee... lees meer
  
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• Lenovo patches two high severity flaws in PC support tool

  24-06-2016 15:49
  
  Lenovo has fixed two high-severity vulnerabilities in the Lenovo Solution Center support tool that is preinstalled on many laptop and desktop PCs. The flaws could allow attackers to take over computers and terminate antivirus processes.
  Lenovo Solution Center (LSC) allows users to check their system's virus and firewall status, update their Lenovo software, perform backups, check battery health, get registration and warranty information and run hardware tests.
  The two new vulnerabilities, track
  
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• Surprise! Charter, Time Warner Cable bilk customers of out millions each year

  24-06-2016 15:47
  
  Here's a shocker: Two of the biggest cable companies in the United States have been overcharging customers by millions of dollars a year. A bipartisan Senate report released Wednesday spills the beans on Charter and Time Warner Cable, industry giants that just combined in a deal worth $79 billion.During the first four months of 2016, Time Warner overcharged customers by $640,000, according to the report. By the end of the year, those bogus charges are expected to soar to an estimated $
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Why every CIO needs to know that some APIs don’t matter

  24-06-2016 15:40
  
  “How many APIs do we have?”If this email from your CEO or a board member hasn’t hit your inbox yet, it’s coming.6 out of ten corporate board members are now saying they want more focus on digital disruption, and two-thirds of Global 2000 CEOs are predicted to put digital transformation at the center of corporate strategy by 2017. Digital transformation has become a hot topic well beyond the boundaries of IT.By the same token, so have APIs. Your stakeholders may be le
  
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• Adele's new album is finally coming to Apple Music and Spotify

  24-06-2016 14:57
  
  Music streaming services can finally say “Hello” to Adele.
  Recode has confirmed that Adele’s latest album 25 will be coming to Apple Music, Spotify, and all the other music streaming services on Friday starting at midnight. The album originally came out seven months ago, back in November 2015.
  25 instantly became one of the best-selling albums ever, moving over three million copies in a single week. The album’s first single, “Hello,” was made available t
  
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• These sensors make IoT click

  24-06-2016 14:55
  
  Slideshow: Check out the sensors that make IoT clickImage by Stephen LawsonSensors are at the heart of the Internet of Things, collecting the data that powers wearables and smart cities alike. This week in San Jose, makers of sensors and related gear gathered for the Sensors Expo & Conference. Here's a look at some of these components.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• Arista infringes on Cisco networking patents, trade agency says

  24-06-2016 14:54
  
  In a move that could lead to a ban on selling its products in the United States, the US International Trade Commission has ruled that Arista does in fact infringe on a number of Cisco’s technology patents.
  Arista now must decide if it wants to ask the US government to overturn a so-called “import ban” or ask that an appeals court toss the decision, observers say. It could also decide to build products in the US – a move that Cisco says would “not only would vi
  
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• The Starry Station Wi-Fi router sticks with simplicity

  24-06-2016 14:53
  
  If you've reviewed tech products for as long as I have, you'll have learned that categories of products have archetypes. These days, for example, laptops are (for the most part) slim black boxes and monitors are thin glass rectangles. Mobile phones, which used to have clamshell designs, are now all metal (or metal-looking) slabs with a glass front. And home wireless routers tend to be small black boxes bristling with more antennas than an NSA surveillance van.
  The Starry Station wireless router
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: 4 simple tips will totally transform your blogging strategy

  24-06-2016 14:50
  
  When it comes to online marketing and content marketing, a company’s blog is a crucial to being successful. However, very few businesses make the most of this medium. The good news is that the differences between average blogs and high performing blogs really aren’t that dramatic. With a few simple changes, you can enjoy the benefits of a powerful blog with highly engaged readers.There are good blogs and there are bad blogs. Contrary to popular belief, the differences between the for
  
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• EVGA GTX 1080 FTW: The most powerful graphics card in the world, made better

  24-06-2016 14:49
  
  This is the GeForce GTX 1080 you’ve been waiting for.
  Don’t get me wrong: The reference version of the GTX 1080 exploded onto the scene asthe most badass graphics card ever. But the first volley of GTX 1080s available—in very limited quantities—were restricted to rebrands of the Nvidia Founders Edition alone. While that’s a nice card, the Founders Edition costs $100 over the GTX 1080’s $600 MSRP, and that surcharge doesn’t even get you an overclock or a
  
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• The end of BigLittle: Ruby unifies integer classes

  24-06-2016 14:48
  
  The latest upgrade to Ruby, the popular open source dynamic language, will enhance both performance and simplicity.
  A preview of the upgrade, Ruby 2.4.0, was released this week. The general release of is due on Christmas Day, December 25, with a beta release due several months prior to general availability, Ruby founder Yukihiro Matsumoto said.[ Download InfoWorld’s essential guide to microservices and learn how to create modern Web and mobile applications that scale. | Cut to the key new
  
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• How to use Siri on macOS Sierra

  24-06-2016 14:47
  At Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s conference earlier this month, we learned that Siri would be the marquee feature in Apple’s next operating system for the Mac—macOS Sierra. Yes, Siri: Apple’s voice interface that was introduced nearly five years ago on the iPhone (and was a stand-alone iOS app before the company was acquired by Apple). If you use Siri often on your iOS device, then you’ll find Siri on the Mac to be quite similar. But since the Mac experience
  
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• How to use Picture in Picture in macOS Sierra

  24-06-2016 14:46
  
  Picture in Picture (PiP) is one of the features I’m looking forward to the most in the new version of the Mac operating system, macOS Sierra. PiP displays a small video widow that stays on top of the screen and is open at all times. If you switch apps, the video window doesn’t get buried under everything else on your screen.
  If you are like me and you like to watch sports events in other parts of the world, PiP is a great way to watch a game while working. Or maybe you want to watch
  
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• How to make IT governance work

  24-06-2016 13:49
  
  Business executives are able to hold two contradictory thoughts in their heads: Technology is costly, but the internal IT services they use are free. An IT governance process is the way to get those execs to understand IT’s true costs — and opportunities.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• Why the UK's vote to leave the EU will have little effect on its data protection rules

  24-06-2016 13:42
  
  With the haircut that the sterling-euro exchange rate has taken in the wake of the U.K.'s vote to leave the European Union, the U.K. has suddenly become a low-cost country for companies wishing to host or process the personal information of EU citizens.EU businesses will need to weigh that price cut against the regulatory uncertainty Thursday's vote introduced -- but it turns out that's surprisingly small, at least in the short to medium term.As for U.K. businesses hoping for more relaxed data p
  
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• Digitalisering vooral voor verhoging efficiëntie, behalve in retail

  24-06-2016 13:13
  In digitaliseringsstrategieën hebben klantgerichte processen minder prioriteit, behalve in de detailhandel. Daar heeft pakweg twee derde van de bedrijven de B2C-kanalen gedigitaliseerd. Ruwweg een derde van de organisaties geeft echter toe niet erg met digitalisering bezig te zijn. Hierop duidt onderzoek door... lees meer
  
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• Apple discontinuing Thunderbolt Display

  24-06-2016 08:40
  
  Apple is discontinuing its Thunderbolt Display, the high-resolution external display that users of the MacBook and other Macs could use to get a better picture and work with more apps.The company said Thursday that the 27-inch widescreen display with LED backlight technology will be available on Apple’s online store, Apple retail stores and authorized resellers while supplies last.The Thunderbolt Display currently retails on the Apple online store at US$999. It has a 2560 by 1440 pixels re
  
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• Qualcomm seeks Chinese court’s help against defiant phone maker

  24-06-2016 08:12
  
  Qualcomm is seeking the help of a Chinese court to get a local smartphone maker, Meizu, to agree to licensing terms for patents that the company broadly agreed to with the Chinese government last year.The chip company said Friday it has asked the Beijing Intellectual Property Court for a ruling that the terms of a patent license it offered Meizu comply with China's Anti-Monopoly Law, and the U.S. company’s “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing obligations.”Qualcomm
  
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• Seagate targets storage for drones and robots

  24-06-2016 05:44
  
  Seagate is targeting drones and robots as it looks to add its storage technologies to new devices."There's a huge opportunity there," said Patrick Ferguson, a product manager at Seagate. "I'm really excited about it."Manufacturers make drones easy to fly, but storage isn't a heavy consideration, Ferguson said.Robots and drones generate a lot of data, but have limited internal storage to retain all that information. For example, drones with multiple cameras generate a lot of video, but just one C
  
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• U.S. court rules that FBI can hack into a computer without a warrant

  24-06-2016 04:06
  
  A U.S. court has ruled that the FBI can hack into a computer without a warrant -- a move which is troubling privacy advocates.The criminal case involves a child pornography site, Playpen, that had been accessible through Tor, a browser designed for anonymous web surfing.The FBI, however, managed to take over the site in 2014, and then tracked down and arrested its members by hacking their computers. This allowed law enforcement to secretly collect their IP addresses.To read this article in full
  
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• DARPA is looking to make huge strides in machine learning

  24-06-2016 01:14
  
  The U.S. Defense Department's research and development arm is offering to fund projects that will simplify the massively complex task of building models for machine learning applications.Models are a fundamental part of machine learning. Similar to algorithms, they help teach computers to, say, identify a cat in a photo, forecast weather from historical data or sort spam from legitimate email.But writing the models takes time and requires many skills. Typically, data scientists, subject mat
  
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