Ken Garen, CPA, Co-Founder and President, UBCC

Twitter billionaire Jack Dorsey: Automation will even put tech jobs in jeopardy Catherine Clifford Published Fri, May 22 20202:52 PM EDT Updated The rise of artificial intelligence will make even software engineers less sought after. That’s because artificial intelligence will soon write its own software, according to Jack Dorsey , the tech billionaire boss of Twitter and Square . And that’s going to put some beginning-level software engineers in a tough spot. “We talk a lot about the self-driving trucks in and whatnot” when discussing how automation will replace jobs held by humans, Dorsey told former Democratic presidential hopeful Andrew Yang on an episode of the “Yang Speaks” podcast published Thursday. But A.I. “is even coming for programming” jobs, Dorsey said. “A lot of the goals of machine learning and deep learning is to write the software itself over time so a lot of entry-level programming jobs will just not be as relevant anymore,” Dorsey told Yang. Currently, softwa...

Nearly half of Twitter accounts discussing coronavirus are likely bots, researchers say By  Kelly Taylor Hayes May 22, 2020 Updated Misinformation about COVID-19 has spread far and fast online.  PITTSBURGH  -  Nearly half of the Twitter accounts sharing information about the novel coronavirus are likely bots, according to researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. Researchers analyzed more than 200 million tweets discussing coronavirus or COVID-19 since January. They found that nearly half were sent by accounts that behave more like a convincing bot than an actual human.  Of the top 50 influential retweeters, 82% were likely bots, the research showed. Out of the top 1,000 retweeters, 62% were likely bots. More than 100 types of inaccurate COVID-19 stories were identified by researchers, including misinformation about potential cures and conspiracy theories — such as hospitals being filled with mannequins or the coronavirus being linked to 5G towers...

WORLD’S FASTEST INTERNET SPEED SEES DOWNLOAD SPEEDS 1 MILLION-TIMES FASTER THAN CURRENT BROADBAND A rate of 40 terabits-per-second is fast enough to download 1,000 HD films in a single second Anthony Cuthbertson May 22, 2020 Researchers in Australia have achieved a world record internet speed of 44.2 terabits per second, allowing users to download 1,000 HD movies in a single second. A team from Monash, Swinburne and RMIT universities used a ‘micro-comb’ optical chip containing hundreds of infrared lasers to transfer data across existing communications infrastructure in Melbourne. The highest commercial internet speed anywhere in the world is currently in Singapore, where the average download speed is 197.3 megabits per second (mbps). In Australia, the average download speed is 43.4 mbps – one million-times slower than the speeds achieved in the latest test. “There’s a bit of a global race on at the moment to get this technology to a commercial stage, as the ‘micro-comb’ at its heart i...

Mark Zuckerberg: Half of Facebook may work remotely by 2030 “We are going to be the most forward-leaning company on remote work at our scale,” the Facebook CEO said in an interview. By Dylan Byers May 21, 2020, 10:14 AM PDT Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Thursday that the social media giant will start allowing many of its 50,000 employees and new recruits to work from home on a permanent basis, adding to a small but growing number of tech companies that have embraced decentralized work during the coronavirus pandemic. "We are going to be the most forward-leaning company on remote work at our scale, with a thoughtful and responsible plan for how to do this," Zuckerberg said in an interview. "We're going to do it in a measured way over time." Within the next five to 10 years, Zuckerberg anticipates that about 50 percent of Facebook's workforce will work remotely. That would mean a significant shift in the concentration of personnel that cou...

Just turning your phone on qualifies as searching it, court rules  Location data requires a warrant since 2018; lock screen may now, too. KATE COX - 5/21/2020, 12:40 PM Smartphones are a rich data trove not only for marketers but also for law enforcement. Police and federal investigators love to get their hands on all that juicy personal information during an investigation. But thanks to the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution and all the case law built upon it, police generally need a warrant to search your phone—and that includes just looking at the lock screen, a judge has ruled ( PDF ). Usually when the topic of a phone search comes up in court, the question has to do with unlocking. Generally, courts have held that law enforcement can compel you to use your body, such as your fingerprint (or your face ), to unlock a phone but that they cannot compel you to share knowledge, such as a PIN . In this recent case, however, the FBI did not unlock the phone. Instead, they only...

ARTIFICIAL EYE THAT 'SEES' LIKE A HUMAN COULD TRANSFORM ROBOTICS A human-like artificial eye uses light-sensitive nanowires as a retina( Getty Images/iStockphoto ) A human user of the bionic eye would gain night vision capabilities, researchers say Anthony Cuthbertson @ADCuthbertson May 21, 2020 Scientists have developed an artificial eye that could provide vision for humanoid robots , or even function as a bionic eye for visually impaired people in the future. Researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology built the ElectroChemical Eye – dubbed EC-Eye – to resemble the size and shape of a biological eye, but with vastly greater potential. The eye mimics the human iris and retina using a lens to focus light onto a dense arrays of light-sensitive nanowires. Information is then passed through the wires, which act like the brain’s visual cortex, to a computer for processing. During tests, the computer was able to recognise the letters ‘E’, ‘I’ and ‘Y’ when ...

Chinese state news agency unveils 'the world's first 3D AI anchor' after 'cloning' a human reporter Xinhua reveals its first AI-powered newsreader using 3D modelling technology Footage shows the lifelike virtual presenter making her debut in a virtual studio Developers said they 'cloned' the looks and actions of a journalist at the agency The news outlet had introduced four 2D AI anchors before the latest creation By  EMILIA JIANG FOR MAILONLINE PUBLISHED:   07:20 EDT, 21 May 2020  |  UPDATED:   07:34 EDT, 21 May 2020   China 's state news agency has revealed its first 3D AI-powered news anchor after replicating the looks and the actions of a human journalist with cutting-edge technologies. The virtual female presenter, branded as the world's first of its kind, can move around smoothly and display complex facial expressions. She can even change her outfits and hairstyles according to different scenarios, a spok...