Unveiled at I/O 2018, Google Duplex was a highlight of the keynote, but also a controversy in the ensuing days. From accusations of “tricking” humans with the use of “uh” and “umm” to the lack of a live demo, Google finally revealed more about the Assistant integrated feature today that is still on track for a limited launch this summer.
The amazement over Google Duplex at I/O 2018 quickly veered into criticism over the lack of disclosure and questions about the on-stage demo itself. I think, somewhat lost in this furor, is the sheer impressiveness of Duplex and what an achievement it is for technology. But what exactly is it, and how does it work? And what will it be able to do for you?
Questions and criticism immediately arose following the unveil of Google Duplex at I/O 2018, with Google quickly clarifying some of the worrying user-facing aspects. More details have now emerged following the company’s weekly all-hands meeting.
In the days since I/O 2018, critique has primarily been lobbied against Google Duplex. There are problems with the feature, but to me — at least — it’s clear that the company thought about some of the societal impacts associated with a nearly indistinguishable human voice out in the world.
However, I think another feature Google announced deserves a similar level of criticism due to its broad impact. Enter John Legend.
We were shown a lot of really cool tricks at I/O 2018 last week, but by far one of the most impressive was Google Duplex. A feature designed for Google Assistant, Duplex is able to make a convincing voice to perform a phone call, right down to reacting to questions posed to it. However, as many have pointed out, there’s potentially a pretty creepy side to this technology. Now, some parodies are showing that off.
During the I/O ’18 keynote, Google showed off a new service called ‘Duplex’ that could call different businesses and schedule appointments, all while sounding very human-like. Since Duplex never announced that it was a bot and actually tricked others into believing it was human, the internet quickly began to argue the morality of this Google service.
In the future, Google Assistant is gaining a wild futuristic feature where it can make phone calls to restaurants and hair salons, for example. In essence, users can have Assistant make a call on their behalf that sounds natural and understands nuance, while being able to fail gracefully if it cannot handle the call.
