Robot ‘Personal Assistants’ Could Become Your New Best Friend
You may not have unwrapped a robot on Christmas, but your new year will be filled with artificial intelligence. Facebook, Google, Microsoft and other technology companies, large and small, are making rapid advancements with virtual personal assistants that can solve problems and even complete tasks. “We’re going to start to see more personal assistants, and the ones that are already online will get more useful,” said Brian Blau, an...
Consumer Confidential: TiVo Users: Your TV Watching Is Being Watched
If you’re a TiVo user, your digital video recorder may be ratting you out to advertisers. In the latest example of consumer privacy being threatened by Big Data, TiVo’s number-crunching subsidiary earlier this month announced a partnership with media heavyweight Viacom that helps advertisers target TV viewers with specific commercials. Think of it like this: A car company wants to reach men in their 20s. Viacom knows that younger guys...
10 Reasons Why You Will Always Be Poor
Many Americans are clearly not experts at managing their finances and end up broke month after month. The cycle of overspending leaves them poor, even if their income means they are considered well above the poverty line. A third of higher-income households — those that bring in $75,000 or more a year — live paycheck to paycheck, a survey from SunTrust Banks found. GOBankingRates talked to numerous personal finance experts, asking...
Money Talk: How Installment Debt and Revolving Debt Differ
Question: I need to understand how credit reporting agencies treat personal unsecured loan debt versus credit card debt. I am considering getting a personal loan from a reputable lender to pay down my credit card debt. The amount of my overall debt will still be the same, just in a different category. How will my credit score be affected? Answer: What you need to understand is how credit scoring formulas treat installment debt (loans)...
‘Journal’ Cuts Hurt Consumer Reporting
When the Wall Street Journal’s top editor announced Thursday a “full transformation of our newsroom,” one that would include closing bureaus and cutting dozens of jobs, one change drew particular ire: The paper would be “scaling back significantly” its personal-finance team. For years, that team has been regarded as a pioneer of consumer reporting — that plain-English brand of service journalism written for the middle class. That...
