Latest news with #Cortana
Time of India
3 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Mark Zuckerberg finally found a use for his Metaverse — War
I can't think of any other deal that more encapsulates how Silicon Valley has changed in the past couple of years than this one, announced Thursday in a press release: Anduril and Meta are partnering to design, build, and field a range of integrated XR products that provide warfighters with enhanced perception and enable intuitive control of autonomous platforms on the battlefield. For starters, Anduril Industries Inc. is a defense tech company co-founded by Palmer Luckey , the man who created the Oculus VR headset that was acquired by Meta Platforms Inc. for $2 billion in 2014, only for Luckey to be pushed out when it emerged he had financially backed a pro-Trump campaign group. That he would be welcomed back with open arms is yet another sign that such stances are no longer taboo in the halls of Silicon Valley companies. (It could be argued they never should have been.) Second, developing technology for war had been considered a hard red line for many of the engineers working within those leafy campuses, at least in the era after the dot-com boom. At Google, for instance, workers in 2018 held walkouts and forced executives to abandon projects related to military use. Today, defense applications of technology are something companies want to shout from their rooftops, not bury in the basement. (Again, it could be argued that should have always been the case. Who will create tech for the US military if not US tech companies?) In Meta's case, there's another factor at play. Mark Zuckerberg 's deal with Anduril — which you assume is just the start of Meta's military hardware ambitions — offers a lifeline to its ailing Reality Labs business. The unit has lost more than $70 billion since the start of 2019. Advancements in quality haven't led to jumps in sales. I've written before that fitness applications are a great selling point, but apparently too few people agree with me. A newer form factor, sunglasses made in partnership with Ray-Ban, have shown potential but still represent a niche product. Live Events So instead, maybe the 'killer app' for mixed reality is indeed a killer app. 'My mission has long been to turn warfighters into technomancers,' Luckey is quoted as saying in a press release. 'And the products we are building with Meta do just that.' Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories A prototype of the 'Eagle Eye' helmet being developed by the companies is due to be delivered to the Pentagon this year, Luckey told journalist Ashlee Vance in a podcast published alongside the official announcement. He compared its utility to what a player wears in the video game Halo — a heads-up display offering reams of intricate information on targets and locations, plus an AI assistant, Cortana, relaying critical and lifesaving directions. What's also striking about this shift is that it is a sign the historical flow of technological innovation is being turned around. Silicon Valley began as a region set up to develop chips for military tech before the assembled talent branched out into making products for businesses and consumers, such as the personal computer. Many breakthroughs have followed this direction of travel — the internet, the microwave, GPS, super glue, to name a few — but it is now increasingly the other way around. As Luckey put it during the podcast discussing the deal, it turns out that Meta's headsets are 'just as useful on the battlefield as they are on the head of any consumer.' See also: artificial intelligence, developed first (and perhaps, at the cutting edge, always) by private sector tech companies. The opportunity is too big to pass up and too lucrative to hold grudges. Luckey says he was willing to work with Meta again because it had become a much different place from the one he was booted out of. Now friends again, he said he believed that Zuckerberg received bad advice when told to fire him and that his coming round to more Republican ways of thinking is genuine — as evidenced by his willingness to make Meta's AI available for government use, too. I've little reason to question Luckey's judgment here, though I wonder if it might be time for Meta to revise its mission statement. 'Build the future of human connection,' it states today, not yet updated to reflect that it's now also working on the future of human conflict. This column reflects the personal views of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners. Dave Lee is Bloomberg Opinion's US technology columnist. He was previously a correspondent for the Financial Times and BBC News.
Yahoo
18-03-2025
- Yahoo
A rather pleasing Windows 11 update bug automatically uninstalls Copilot and unpins it from the taskbar, which is jolly nice of it
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. As a writer who takes pride in, y'know, writing his own work, I don't have a whole lot of use for Microsoft Copilot. Sure, if you need an unimportant document summarising it's probably pretty handy, but Microsoft's big push for an AI PC, Copilot-always-available future has left me rather cold. It seems a new Windows 11 bug might have the problem in hand, however, as it can automatically uninstall Copilot and unpin it from the taskbar on certain installs. As spotted by Windows Latest, the support document for Windows 11 KB5053598 has been updated with a Microsoft Copilot entry, stating: "We're aware of an issue with the Microsoft Copilot app affecting some devices. The app is unintentionally uninstalled and unpinned from the taskbar. "Microsoft is working on a resolution to address this issue. In the meantime, affected users can reinstall the app from the Microsoft Store and manually pin it to the taskbar." If you really, really want to of course. After my initial testing of Copilot, where I confirmed my suspicions that it, err, wasn't for me, I banished it to the same realm as Microsoft's previous AI attempt, Cortana. Begone from my taskbar and my thoughts, foul assistant. The bug appears to affect Windows 11 24H2, 23H2, and 22H2 versions when updated to KB5053598, along with Windows 10 22H2 and 21H2 installs when the KB5053606 update is installed. Of course, Copilot is a major selling point for the concept of the AI PC, which still doesn't seem to have set users hearts ablaze with the promise of an AI-assisted Windows future. And as a somewhat clumsy typist I've found myself accidentally knocking the Copilot key on virtually every AI PC I've got my hands on, causing it to rise from the taskbar like an unwanted eldritch god. This bug appears to fix that issue, which strikes as somewhat counterintuitive to Microsoft's goals. Still, while the AI PC future may be coming for us whether we like it or not, at least Copilot can currently be uninstalled via the settings menu if you don't have a use for it. Or you could just install this update and hope that this feature—sorry, bug—does it for you. That'll teach it for installing itself on your PC without consent. While Copilot in some form or fashion may one day be the primary way many users interact with their Windows PC (perish the thought), its uses are limited for now, so in many ways this bug may be doing many of us a favour. It's not quite up there with haunting your printer, but as amusing Windows 11 bugs go, I'll take it. Best gaming PC: The top pre-built gaming laptop: Great devices for mobile gaming.
Tahawul Tech
12-03-2025
- Tahawul Tech
smart speakers Archives
Alexa, Google Assistant, Siri, Cortana, and other digital assistants can help you in dozens of ways, and you don't have to lift a finger to summon them—just speak their names. If you already know you want a smart speaker, scroll down for our top recommendations.
