Your Weekly Tech Briefing

1. How I learned to stop worrying and hunt the drone

What is the best way to stop a drone? A piece written by Kelsey Atherton looks for the best methods to stop cheap drones from wreaking havoc. Drones have been used to invade our privacy, drop IEDs and even film suicide attacks. The problem is: there is simply no clear answer. Still, we've compiled all the solutions from the article, in case you need to shoot those privacy invaders down. No, we are not talking about Amazon Echo or Google Home.

• Eagle protectors
• Shotgun-wielding Virginians
• Interceptor drones carrying nets
• Anti-drone drone squads (Fighting fire with fire)
• Net firing bazookas
• Drone Jammers
• Microwave guns
• Drone-killing laser cannons
• Counter-drone systems

2. What happens if you pit AI against AI?

Google's DeepMind thought it'd be interesting to put AI agents on survival mode and see what happens. Would AI reveal its Machiavellian nature? The results were interesting. DeepMind designed a system in which if all players act selfishly, they all lose, but if only one acts selfishly, it would win big. This is the classical prisoner dilemma. The players followed whatever strategy was more beneficial, which in some situations made them cooperative, and in others, aggressive. The most interesting case was where a computationally more powerful player was introduced into the game. It realised its power and became aggressive in its efforts to win. However, when the players realised in which cases they could gain more by cooperating, they cooperated.

What is the takeaway message here? Well, it might be simply that AI may not pity us if there's any conflict of interest involved.

3. Why did the company that makes body cameras for police buy two computer vision companies?

Taser, the same company that makes Tasers (stun guns), has acquired two computer-vision companies. The companies' body cameras will launch an artificial intelligence group, Axon AI. The aim of this project is to reduce the workload police officers are under due to the enormous data gathered by those cameras. The system is expected to offer a way to search the visual contents of a video feed. Maybe this will lay the foundations for the surveillance state everyone is afraid of.

4. Why is Oculus in trouble?

Or is virtual reality in trouble? According to a report from Business Insider, Oculus closed down 200 of its 500 virtual reality demo stations due to low interest. People who worked at the stations told Business Insider that days passed without anyone trying out the devices. However, just looking at this report, it's still hard to say VR is doomed. Still, virtual reality devices are still bulky and tethered to a PC, which make them a hard sell in the mass market. Guess who's aware of this fact? Mark Zuckerberg. Talking to Business Insider in 2016, Zuckerberg set the expectations for VR. "It could be five years, it could be 10 years, it could be 15 or 20. My guess is that it will be at least 10."