Microsoft Cortana is about to become your all-purpose productivity bot and other top stories.

• Microsoft Cortana is about to become your all-purpose productivity bot

  Microsoft Cortana has been playing catch-up with Siri and the Google Assistant, but that’s about to change. The company Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded in 1975 has made no secret of the fact that it intends to become an AI powerhouse. Many of the recent changes in Microsoft Office have been related to productivity automation. You can click a button to create a slideshow in PowerPoint, use the Editor feature in Word to improve your writing, and find out whether you spend too much time processi..

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• Why you should be afraid of Google's expansion into hardware

  

  Google first made waves in the hardware market when it purchased Motorola in 2011 for $12.5 billion. A company on the scale of Google getting involved in hardware put some established manufacturers on edge, though anxiety abated when Google later sold Motorola to Lenovo for $3 billion. Without being directly involved in hardware production, Google has continued to exert a huge influence over the market. Numerous hardware companies supported Android early on, helping it become the de facto alter..

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• Tesla to fine drivers who hog Supercharger stations: Could it backfire?

  

  December 18, 2016 —Tesla Motors Inc. will begin imposing a $0.40-per-minute fine on drivers who leave their cars parked at Supercharger stations more than five minutes after their vehicles finish charging, the company announced Friday in an effort to maximize station availability by keeping people moving."A customer would never leave a car parked by the pump at a gas station and the same thinking applies with Superchargers," Tesla CEO Elon Musk wrote in a blog. Behavioral economists have noted,..

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• Washington Post launches Trump Twitter fact-checker: Will it work?

  

  December 18, 2016 —More than a month after Donald Trump's Twitter-centric campaign ended in victory, The Washington Post has launched a new tool to hold the president-elect accountable for what he posts on his preferred social network. A Google Chrome plugin called "RealDonaldContext" will fact-check any content on Mr. Trump's Twitter page, and provide context for emotionally charged attacks on people, businesses, or institutions. "Donald Trump's primary means of communicating with the public i..

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• When Will 'Super Mario Run' Come Out On Android?

  

  This is not going to end well for ol' Mario. image: Dave Thier Warning: don't expect a definitive answer here. Super Mario Run, a flawed but ultimately fun and faithful adaptation of the legendary franchise for iOS, is burning up the world of mobile gaming for a moment. Or at least, some portion of the world of mobile gaming, I should say. While iPhone and iPad users are happily collecting coins and rescuing princesses, Android users are out in the cold, leaving millions of people short of th..

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• John Podesta says FBI isn't talking to him about email hacks

  

  John Podesta said Sunday in his first interview since Election Day that he has only heard once from the FBI about the hack into his emails — and that was in early October. “The first time I was contacted by the FBI was two days after WikiLeaks started ...

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• Ghost Shark, the pointy-nosed blue chimaera, spotted off the coast of Hawaii

  

  The deep-sea thriving pointy-nosed blue chimaera or ghost shark has been captured on camera for the first time, off the coasts of Hawaii and California. The pointy-nosed blue chimaera is considered rare and it has been earlier found only in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Ghost sharks have very strange features and as they live in deep-sea, they are with pale eyes. The pointy-nose blue chimaera showcased in recently released video, has been termed as the first of its kind, by scientists. The vi..

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• Shared Electric Car Platform Will Reduce Costs For Nissan, Renault, and Mitsubishi

  

  In an attempt to significantly reduce the costs of manufacturing an electric car, Nissan, Renault, and Mitsubishi will share their engineering resources to develop one chassis suitable for every electric car model the three companies build. Renault CEO ...

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Growing Risk of HIV in the US .	Drug overdose deaths increased significantly in past 5 years .
Apple Confirms Interest in Autonomous Cars in Letter to Federal Regulators .	A startup has unveiled its hydrogen-electric truck that will hit the road in 2020 — here's a closer look .