/* ---- Google Analytics Code Below */

Saturday, November 12, 2016

(Update) First Look at Google Home Assistant

As part of my long running look at virtual assistants, started to look at Google Home, in comparison to Amazon Echo for smart home applications.  Compared to my nearly two year to date view of the Echo.

Excerpt of my notes: 

 .... Google Home does have better bass in its own speaker,  can be bluetooth linked to other speakers but have not tried that.    Has some native podcasts,  but not many.   Has a number of integrated news casts, but no Tunein, (Yes it does have Tunein now, but not their podcasts)  which I have gotten used to for streaming local news.  Needs considerably more useful content.  In general is slightly slower to react to a command than Echo, annoying once  you have gotten used to echo.   Has a female voice very similar to Alexa, but a little less upbeat and less smooth.   When Google does language translations, words or phrases, another, different voice takes over .... which sounds odd ... that voice speaks too quickly, which does not help, since you are implying you don't know the translation .... and probably need it to be slower for recognition and repetition.  Does from-English, but not to-English translations. ... 

   Google/She has a similar problem in pronouncing constructed text, she trips up on odd words and proper nouns where general pronunciation rules don't apply.  She does do a better job of maintaining a conversation ... that is if you ask for some information during a stream of music, she goes back to the stream.  Echo often loses what it was doing originally.  Still have not seen obvious examples where she is going deeper or remembers context of a previous conversation.  Which would be hints at 'intelligence'.  Or the use of your Google Knowledge Graph, except for the simplest things like location.   Assume this is developing.  Or use of 'common sense' semantics'.  Still seems very search oriented.  She still can't create a calendar entry by voice, though she links to Google's calendar.     All interactions show up in text on the App, which is good for reference.      ......  

Is Samsung's Otto next? No pedestal Siri in sight.

See Google Home site.  

No comments: