Questões

Robots, the next generation of soccer players

If you think a robot will steal your job, you are not alone. Soccer players should be worried too. The next Messi probably won’t be of flesh and blood but plastic and metal. The concept emerged during the conference “Workshop on grand challenges in artificial intelligence,” held in Tokyo in 1992, and independently, in 1993, when Professor Alan Mackworth from the University of Bristol in Canada described an experiment with small soccer players in a scientific article. Over 40 teams already participated in the first RoboCup tournament in 1997, and the competition is held every year. The RoboCup Federation wants to play and win a game against a real-world cup humans’ team by 2050. The idea behind artificially intelligent players is to investigate how robots perceive motion and communicate with each other. Physical abilities like walking, running, and kicking the ball while maintaining balance are crucial to improving robots for other tasks like rescue, home, industry, and education. Designing robots for sports requires much more than experts in state-of-the-art technology. Humans and machines do not share the same skills. Engineers need to impose limitations on soccer robots to imitate soccer players as much as possible and ensure following the game’s rules. RoboCup Soccer Federation, the “FIFA” of robots, which supports five leagues, imposes restrictions on players’ design and rules of the game. Each has its own robot design and game rules to give room for different scientific goals. The number of players, their size, the ball type, and the field dimensions are different for each league. In the humanoid league the players are humanlike robots with human-like senses. However, they are rather slow. Many of the skills needed to fully recreate actual soccer player movements are still in the early stages of research. The game becomes exciting for middle and small size leagues. The models are much simpler; they are just boxes with a cyclopean eye. Their design focuses on team behavior: recognizing an opponent, cooperating with team members, receiving and giving a standard FIFA size ball. Today, soccer robots are entirely autonomous. They wireless “talk” to each other, make decisions regarding strategy in real-time, replace an “injured” player, and shoot goals. The only person in a RoboCup game is the referee. The team coaches are engineers in charge of training the RoboCups’ artificial intelligence for fair play: the robots don’t smash against each other or pull their shirts.

The next RoboCup competition will soon be played, virtually, with rules that will allow teams to participate without establishing physical contact.

Available at:https://www.ua-magazine.com/2021/05/12/robots-the-next-generation-of-soccer-players. Retrieved on: July 4th, 2021. Adapted.

Robots, the next generation of soccer players

If you think a robot will steal your job, you are not alone. Soccer players should be worried too. The next Messi probably won’t be of flesh and blood but plastic and metal. The concept emerged during the conference “Workshop on grand challenges in artificial intelligence,” held in Tokyo in 1992, and independently, in 1993, when Professor Alan Mackworth from the University of Bristol in Canada described an experiment with small soccer players in a scientific article. Over 40 teams already participated in the first RoboCup tournament in 1997, and the competition is held every year. The RoboCup Federation wants to play and win a game against a real-world cup humans’ team by 2050. The idea behind artificially intelligent players is to investigate how robots perceive motion and communicate with each other. Physical abilities like walking, running, and kicking the ball while maintaining balance are crucial to improving robots for other tasks like rescue, home, industry, and education. Designing robots for sports requires much more than experts in state-of-the-art technology. Humans and machines do not share the same skills. Engineers need to impose limitations on soccer robots to imitate soccer players as much as possible and ensure following the game’s rules. RoboCup Soccer Federation, the “FIFA” of robots, which supports five leagues, imposes restrictions on players’ design and rules of the game. Each has its own robot design and game rules to give room for different scientific goals. The number of players, their size, the ball type, and the field dimensions are different for each league. In the humanoid league the players are humanlike robots with human-like senses. However, they are rather slow. Many of the skills needed to fully recreate actual soccer player movements are still in the early stages of research. The game becomes exciting for middle and small size leagues. The models are much simpler; they are just boxes with a cyclopean eye. Their design focuses on team behavior: recognizing an opponent, cooperating with team members, receiving and giving a standard FIFA size ball. Today, soccer robots are entirely autonomous. They wireless “talk” to each other, make decisions regarding strategy in real-time, replace an “injured” player, and shoot goals. The only person in a RoboCup game is the referee. The team coaches are engineers in charge of training the RoboCups’ artificial intelligence for fair play: the robots don’t smash against each other or pull their shirts.

The next RoboCup competition will soon be played, virtually, with rules that will allow teams to participate without establishing physical contact.

Available at:https://www.ua-magazine.com/2021/05/12/robots-the-next-generation-of-soccer-players. Retrieved on: July 4th, 2021. Adapted.

Robots, the next generation of soccer players

If you think a robot will steal your job, you are not alone. Soccer players should be worried too. The next Messi probably won’t be of flesh and blood but plastic and metal. The concept emerged during the conference “Workshop on grand challenges in artificial intelligence,” held in Tokyo in 1992, and independently, in 1993, when Professor Alan Mackworth from the University of Bristol in Canada described an experiment with small soccer players in a scientific article. Over 40 teams already participated in the first RoboCup tournament in 1997, and the competition is held every year. The RoboCup Federation wants to play and win a game against a real-world cup humans’ team by 2050. The idea behind artificially intelligent players is to investigate how robots perceive motion and communicate with each other. Physical abilities like walking, running, and kicking the ball while maintaining balance are crucial to improving robots for other tasks like rescue, home, industry, and education. Designing robots for sports requires much more than experts in state-of-the-art technology. Humans and machines do not share the same skills. Engineers need to impose limitations on soccer robots to imitate soccer players as much as possible and ensure following the game’s rules. RoboCup Soccer Federation, the “FIFA” of robots, which supports five leagues, imposes restrictions on players’ design and rules of the game. Each has its own robot design and game rules to give room for different scientific goals. The number of players, their size, the ball type, and the field dimensions are different for each league. In the humanoid league the players are humanlike robots with human-like senses. However, they are rather slow. Many of the skills needed to fully recreate actual soccer player movements are still in the early stages of research. The game becomes exciting for middle and small size leagues. The models are much simpler; they are just boxes with a cyclopean eye. Their design focuses on team behavior: recognizing an opponent, cooperating with team members, receiving and giving a standard FIFA size ball. Today, soccer robots are entirely autonomous. They wireless “talk” to each other, make decisions regarding strategy in real-time, replace an “injured” player, and shoot goals. The only person in a RoboCup game is the referee. The team coaches are engineers in charge of training the RoboCups’ artificial intelligence for fair play: the robots don’t smash against each other or pull their shirts.

The next RoboCup competition will soon be played, virtually, with rules that will allow teams to participate without establishing physical contact.

Available at:https://www.ua-magazine.com/2021/05/12/robots-the-next-generation-of-soccer-players. Retrieved on: July 4th, 2021. Adapted.

Revolution Accelerated

How Digital Transformation is Shaping the Future of Banking

Like all businesses, banks have had to act fast to respond to the unprecedented human and economic impact of Covid-19. First, they needed to keep the lights on and ensure business continuity. Second, they had to meet the changing ways customers wanted to engage. Finally, they sought to balance their business priorities with a responsibility to support society. Previous crises cast the banks as part of the problem — this time they are part of the solution. Banks who have embraced modern banking technology have fared better in meeting these challenges. They’ve moved seamlessly to remote working, kept up service for their customers, coped with huge increases in demand and quickly adapted their products. In contrast, banks using legacy ‘spaghetti’ software have struggled. Covid-19 has accelerated the need for modern banking technology, but it didn’t create it. Before coronavirus, the 2020s were already being framed as the decade for digital in the banking industry. Banks’ return on equity were too low and their cost-income ratios were too high. Meanwhile, regulation like open banking was disrupting the industry and increasing competition from new entrants like the GAAFAs (Google, Amazon, Alibaba, Facebook, Apple). Providing seamless digital customer experiences was therefore already a ‘must’. Every year, Temenos partners with the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) for a global study on the future of banking. More than 300 banking leaders are interviewed from retail, commercial and private banks. Over half of these are at C-suite level. In 2020, the study took place amid the Covid-19 crisis. The results give a fascinating insight into banking leaders’ approach during these unprecedented times. But they also show how they see their industry in the years to come. And the findings suggest three trends which will shape the future of banking: 1. New technologies will be the key driver of banking transformation over the next 5 years. 77% of respondents strongly believed that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be the most game-changing of these technologies. They see a diverse range of uses for AI — from personalised customer experience to fraud detection. 2. Banks will overhaul their business models to create digital ecosystems. 80% of respondents believe that banking will become part of a platform of services. 45% are committed to transforming their business models into digital ecosystems.

3. The sun will set on branch banking. World Bank data shows that visits to branches have been steadily declining globally over the last decade. As a result of coronavirus, customers are now more concerned about visiting their branch, and so even more people are willing to try digital applications. This combination of pandemic and increasingly transformative advanced technology has led a majority of respondents (59%) to our survey with the EIU to state that traditional branch-based banking model will be dead in just five years. That’s a 34% increase from last year. The current environment is undoubtedly challenging for banks. But they have the capital, customer relationships and customer data. They are regulated. And most importantly: they still enjoy their customers’ trust. In short, banks are best-placed to succeed if they commit to end-to-end digital transformation. That means a fully digital front office which creates hyper-personalized experiences and ecosystems. And a back office driving efficient operations and rapid innovation. By embracing modern banking technology, banks can support their customers today, create new value for the future and drive new levels of future growth.

Available at: https://www.cnbc.com/advertorial/how-digital-transformation-is-shaping-the-future-of-banking. Retrieved on: July 13th, 2021. Adapted.

Revolution Accelerated

How Digital Transformation is Shaping the Future of Banking

Like all businesses, banks have had to act fast to respond to the unprecedented human and economic impact of Covid-19. First, they needed to keep the lights on and ensure business continuity. Second, they had to meet the changing ways customers wanted to engage. Finally, they sought to balance their business priorities with a responsibility to support society. Previous crises cast the banks as part of the problem — this time they are part of the solution. Banks who have embraced modern banking technology have fared better in meeting these challenges. They’ve moved seamlessly to remote working, kept up service for their customers, coped with huge increases in demand and quickly adapted their products. In contrast, banks using legacy ‘spaghetti’ software have struggled. Covid-19 has accelerated the need for modern banking technology, but it didn’t create it. Before coronavirus, the 2020s were already being framed as the decade for digital in the banking industry. Banks’ return on equity were too low and their cost-income ratios were too high. Meanwhile, regulation like open banking was disrupting the industry and increasing competition from new entrants like the GAAFAs (Google, Amazon, Alibaba, Facebook, Apple). Providing seamless digital customer experiences was therefore already a ‘must’. Every year, Temenos partners with the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) for a global study on the future of banking. More than 300 banking leaders are interviewed from retail, commercial and private banks. Over half of these are at C-suite level. In 2020, the study took place amid the Covid-19 crisis. The results give a fascinating insight into banking leaders’ approach during these unprecedented times. But they also show how they see their industry in the years to come. And the findings suggest three trends which will shape the future of banking: 1. New technologies will be the key driver of banking transformation over the next 5 years. 77% of respondents strongly believed that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be the most game-changing of these technologies. They see a diverse range of uses for AI — from personalised customer experience to fraud detection. 2. Banks will overhaul their business models to create digital ecosystems. 80% of respondents believe that banking will become part of a platform of services. 45% are committed to transforming their business models into digital ecosystems.

3. The sun will set on branch banking. World Bank data shows that visits to branches have been steadily declining globally over the last decade. As a result of coronavirus, customers are now more concerned about visiting their branch, and so even more people are willing to try digital applications. This combination of pandemic and increasingly transformative advanced technology has led a majority of respondents (59%) to our survey with the EIU to state that traditional branch-based banking model will be dead in just five years. That’s a 34% increase from last year. The current environment is undoubtedly challenging for banks. But they have the capital, customer relationships and customer data. They are regulated. And most importantly: they still enjoy their customers’ trust. In short, banks are best-placed to succeed if they commit to end-to-end digital transformation. That means a fully digital front office which creates hyper-personalized experiences and ecosystems. And a back office driving efficient operations and rapid innovation. By embracing modern banking technology, banks can support their customers today, create new value for the future and drive new levels of future growth.

Available at: https://www.cnbc.com/advertorial/how-digital-transformation-is-shaping-the-future-of-banking. Retrieved on: July 13th, 2021. Adapted.

U.S. Finds No Evidence of Alien Technology in Flying Objects, but can’t rule it out, either

WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have found no evidence that aerial phenomena observed by Navy pilots in recent years are alien spacecraft, but they still cannot explain the unusual movements that have mystified scientists and the military. The report determines that a vast majority of more than 120 incidents over the past two decades did not originate from any American military or other advanced US government technology, the officials said. That determination would appear to eliminate the possibility that Navy pilots who reported seeing unexplained aircraft might have encountered programs the government meant to keep secret. But that is about the only conclusive finding in the classified intelligence report, the officials said. And while a forthcoming unclassified version, expected to be released to Congress by June 25, will present few other firm conclusions, senior officials briefed on the intelligence conceded that the very ambiguity of the findings meant the government could not definitively rule out theories that the phenomena observed by military pilots might be alien spacecraft. Americans’ long-running fascination with UFOs has intensified in recent weeks in anticipation of the release of the government report. Former President Barack Obama encouraged the interest when he gave an interview last month about the incidents on “The Late Late Show with James Corden” on CBS. “What is true, and I’m really being serious here,” Mr. Obama said, “is that there is film and records of objects in the skies that we don’t know exactly what they are.’’ The report concedes that much about the observed phenomena remains difficult to explain, including their acceleration, as well as ability to change direction and submerge. One possible explanation — that the phenomena could be weather balloons or other research balloons — does not hold up in all cases, the officials said, because of changes in wind speed at the times of some of the interactions. Many of the more than 120 incidents examined in the report are from Navy personnel, officials said. The report also examined incidents involving foreign militaries over the last two decades. Intelligence officials believe that at least some of the aerial phenomena could have been experimental technology from a rival power, most likely Russia or China. One senior official said without hesitation that U.S. officials knew it was not American technology. He said there was worry among intelligence and military officials that China or Russia could be experimenting with hypersonic technology.

He and other officials spoke about the classified findings in the report on the condition of anonymity.

Available at: <https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/03/us/politics/ ufos-sighting-alien-spacecraft-pentagon.html>. Retrieved on: July 7, 2021.

U.S. Finds No Evidence of Alien Technology in Flying Objects, but can’t rule it out, either

WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have found no evidence that aerial phenomena observed by Navy pilots in recent years are alien spacecraft, but they still cannot explain the unusual movements that have mystified scientists and the military. The report determines that a vast majority of more than 120 incidents over the past two decades did not originate from any American military or other advanced US government technology, the officials said. That determination would appear to eliminate the possibility that Navy pilots who reported seeing unexplained aircraft might have encountered programs the government meant to keep secret. But that is about the only conclusive finding in the classified intelligence report, the officials said. And while a forthcoming unclassified version, expected to be released to Congress by June 25, will present few other firm conclusions, senior officials briefed on the intelligence conceded that the very ambiguity of the findings meant the government could not definitively rule out theories that the phenomena observed by military pilots might be alien spacecraft. Americans’ long-running fascination with UFOs has intensified in recent weeks in anticipation of the release of the government report. Former President Barack Obama encouraged the interest when he gave an interview last month about the incidents on “The Late Late Show with James Corden” on CBS. “What is true, and I’m really being serious here,” Mr. Obama said, “is that there is film and records of objects in the skies that we don’t know exactly what they are.’’ The report concedes that much about the observed phenomena remains difficult to explain, including their acceleration, as well as ability to change direction and submerge. One possible explanation — that the phenomena could be weather balloons or other research balloons — does not hold up in all cases, the officials said, because of changes in wind speed at the times of some of the interactions. Many of the more than 120 incidents examined in the report are from Navy personnel, officials said. The report also examined incidents involving foreign militaries over the last two decades. Intelligence officials believe that at least some of the aerial phenomena could have been experimental technology from a rival power, most likely Russia or China. One senior official said without hesitation that U.S. officials knew it was not American technology. He said there was worry among intelligence and military officials that China or Russia could be experimenting with hypersonic technology.

He and other officials spoke about the classified findings in the report on the condition of anonymity.

Available at: <https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/03/us/politics/ ufos-sighting-alien-spacecraft-pentagon.html>. Retrieved on: July 7, 2021.

U.S. Finds No Evidence of Alien Technology in Flying Objects, but can’t rule it out, either

WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have found no evidence that aerial phenomena observed by Navy pilots in recent years are alien spacecraft, but they still cannot explain the unusual movements that have mystified scientists and the military. The report determines that a vast majority of more than 120 incidents over the past two decades did not originate from any American military or other advanced US government technology, the officials said. That determination would appear to eliminate the possibility that Navy pilots who reported seeing unexplained aircraft might have encountered programs the government meant to keep secret. But that is about the only conclusive finding in the classified intelligence report, the officials said. And while a forthcoming unclassified version, expected to be released to Congress by June 25, will present few other firm conclusions, senior officials briefed on the intelligence conceded that the very ambiguity of the findings meant the government could not definitively rule out theories that the phenomena observed by military pilots might be alien spacecraft. Americans’ long-running fascination with UFOs has intensified in recent weeks in anticipation of the release of the government report. Former President Barack Obama encouraged the interest when he gave an interview last month about the incidents on “The Late Late Show with James Corden” on CBS. “What is true, and I’m really being serious here,” Mr. Obama said, “is that there is film and records of objects in the skies that we don’t know exactly what they are.’’ The report concedes that much about the observed phenomena remains difficult to explain, including their acceleration, as well as ability to change direction and submerge. One possible explanation — that the phenomena could be weather balloons or other research balloons — does not hold up in all cases, the officials said, because of changes in wind speed at the times of some of the interactions. Many of the more than 120 incidents examined in the report are from Navy personnel, officials said. The report also examined incidents involving foreign militaries over the last two decades. Intelligence officials believe that at least some of the aerial phenomena could have been experimental technology from a rival power, most likely Russia or China. One senior official said without hesitation that U.S. officials knew it was not American technology. He said there was worry among intelligence and military officials that China or Russia could be experimenting with hypersonic technology.

He and other officials spoke about the classified findings in the report on the condition of anonymity.

Available at: <https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/03/us/politics/ ufos-sighting-alien-spacecraft-pentagon.html>. Retrieved on: July 7, 2021.