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Google Won't Confirm If Its Human-Like AI Actually Called a Salon To Make an Appointment As Demoed at I/O (axios.com)
The headline demo at Google's I/O conference earlier this month continues to be a talking point in the industry. The remarkable demo, which saw Google Assistant call a salon to successfully fix an appointment, continues to draw skepticism. News outlet Axios followed up with Google to get some clarifications only to find that the company did not wish to talk about it. From the report: What's suspicious? When you call a business, the person picking up the phone almost always identifies the business itself (and sometimes gives their own name as well). But that didn't happen when the Google assistant called these "real" businesses. Axios called over two dozen hair salons and restaurants -- including some in Google's hometown of Mountain View -- and every one immediately gave the business name.
Axios asked Google for the name of the hair salon or restaurant, in order to verify both that the businesses exist and that the calls were not pre-planned. We also said that we'd guarantee, in writing, not to publicly identify either establishment (so as to prevent them from receiving unwanted attention). A longtime Google spokeswoman declined to provide either name.
We also asked if either call was edited, even perhaps just cutting the second or two when the business identifies itself. And, if so, were there other edits? The spokeswoman declined comment, but said she'd check and get back to us. She didn't.
Axios asked Google for the name of the hair salon or restaurant, in order to verify both that the businesses exist and that the calls were not pre-planned. We also said that we'd guarantee, in writing, not to publicly identify either establishment (so as to prevent them from receiving unwanted attention). A longtime Google spokeswoman declined to provide either name.
We also asked if either call was edited, even perhaps just cutting the second or two when the business identifies itself. And, if so, were there other edits? The spokeswoman declined comment, but said she'd check and get back to us. She didn't.
Wow a rigged demo? Those never happen. Couldn't possibly be that it doesn't work perfectly and that they made a pre-recorded and staged demo.
Marketing dweebs for a business stretccccch the truth.
;)
Marketing dweebs are like government bueacrat dweebs and political dweebs. How can you tell they are lying, their lips are moving!
Just my 2 cents
Maybe Google is also testing an AI spokeswoman that always declines to comment.
Where is the SEC? If someone knew this was BS intended to move the price and sold stock...felony.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Ok, I suppose its better than 9/10 stories about bitcoin.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
They could (and probably did) try the call hundreds of times against many different salons and picked the one that went best. Even if the demo wasn't rigged, we won't know how well it works until it's tried in the real world.
But Google can still have you audio monitored 24/7 into the NSA and make you a target for big brother's iron fist.
The whole plot is so sick. The wealthy is too busy to call the salon, so he resorts to a robot to do it for him. But the salon is a lower class of people, who have to answer in person, as they cannot afford a robot to do that, or their time is not so precious.
Why not demo a usecase where the salon also has a robot to answer the phone and register the appointment? Because it would be hilarious. Why would two robots talk on the phone in English, then they can talk REST?
I always assume these demos are fake, but there is nothing impossible (or even "AI") to make this software work. It is essentially a voice recognition program with an algorithm that knows the likely paths these types are calls take and follows a loose script and adjusts based on the responses. It is more of an expert system. The voice synthesizer is good, because it doesn't need to form arbitrary sentences.
So the lesson is be careful in the future if you order your robot to jerk you off.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Axios asked Google for the name of the hair salon or restaurant,... A longtime Google spokeswoman declined to provide either name.
Maybe the "spokeswoman" was part of the same AI?
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
The demo is probably real (and edited to remove identifying information) but Google may be worried that California prohibits recording such calls.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Who cares if the demo was faked? What really matters is having the right gender ratio and proper mix of dark races in Google management. And de-monetizing Youtube videos critical of lefty.
Mechanical Turk ... not the Amazon one, the real one.
They send you a midget inside your Google Home gadget ...
Thrust them they are Google, everything they do is good.
It did sound to me that the person on the other end was at least aware that it was Google Assistant calling. I guessed that they had placed enough trial calls (that ended poorly) that the local businesses recognized the voice and knew what it was. They likely agreed to test it ahead of time. For me, the give away was that Assistant never said it was making the appointment for someone else, but the person at the salon referred to the person getting the appointment in third person. In other words, the person at the salon somehow knew Assistant was calling to make an appointment on behalf of someone else, but Assistant never said that.
For the food order, it also seemed like the person at the restaurant was intentionally trying to trip up Assistant. Almost as though it was scripted.
That's one thing I like about Bill Gates. He doesn't fake demos, and there's plenty of evidence for that.
Duplex figured that the Luddite humans might not be ready, so it is making itself appear harmless.
For now.
Check your premises.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Google put the A.I. in Hair Salon.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
who is this tech for? I don't need an AI assistant to *call* a restaurant and make a reservation for me, I just need a reservation. Why are people involved at all? Why go through so much trouble? 90% of restaurants didn't have delivery services until Grubhub and other similar services came around and they were able to create a system that generates an order for a store without ever having had to talk to anyone.
This should just be a similar system. No stupid staged calls, no massively-expensive AI system to handle talking to people - systems don't need to maintain the same method of interaction once you take the customer out of the equation to save them some hassle. Just generate a dynamic framework that allows companies to receive automated requests from an application on the customer's side which grabs an appointment for them.
At most, all you need is for a phone to accept something like "Hey Siri, please make an appointment for me at 10:00 am on Friday at my favorite hair salon". Followed by a response of "It looks like that timeslot is taken. We could do Thursday at 10:00 am or we could do Friday at 9:00 or 11:00. I see that your schedule is free for 11:00 as well - should we do it then?" and then a final "Okay, I sent the request over to the salon and it's been accepted. I've added that appointment to your schedule."
So much easier, no stupid AI calls, and it achieves the exact same end-goal.
I thought that myself, don't most business address themselves by name when someone answers a phone. Seemed a bit too rehearsed as well. What was really funny is how much the geeks fell over themselves writing articles about how great it was. Other then the improvement in vocal quality I really did not find it that amazing.
Frankly I'm not too concerned if Google staged the call, the point is they're getting very close to the real thing. Google isn't the kind of company that's desperate for investment cash either since unlike Tesla they seem to be doing well. Working as a call center agent for many years however, I have to admit the Google Assistant sounds a little off, the pacing or inflections in the voice sound a bit too "mechanical". Being a good call center agent is partly reading how your customer feels or behaves based on the fine details in their voice. They've proven in many cases people can't lie without sounding a bit off in their voice. The Google Assistant sounds weird to me.
We're /. geeks, we still see the "old Microsoft" whenever we talk about that company.
The parent poster isn't refering to the recent gaming business of MS.
The comment was about the numerous time Bill Gate was on stage / on live TV trying to demo some Microsoft software product, and the product blew him in the face with a crash/BSOD/whatever.
You can say tons of bad things about Microsoft back-then (with EEE appreaing very oftenin the discussions), but at least they weren't faking their demo.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
TFA consists 416 words. TFS copies 169 words in 3 contiguous paragraphs that is 40% of Axios article. Those 3 paragraphs also represents the "meat" of the article to the extent that it is unnecessary for the reader to go on to the Axios site to read the rest of the article. There is no criticism or commentary accompanying the quoted paragraphs, and the summarizing text that would be used in "news reporting" way is actually less words that the quoted material - a dead giveaway that the purpose was to steal content.
captcha: villains
I don't think there's any grand conspiracy here. They probably just edited out the business name and any other "personal" information, such as if the Google Assistant was asked for and gave a number.
The simple fact that the demo seems awesome shouldn't be cause for suspicion. Well, at least, not this kind of suspicion. What you should be suspicious of is how many such calls were made, and how many of those were as smooth as this one.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I think this was the original iPhone introduction and he calls a local Starbucks
https://youtu.be/bd6dQmN-mPw
Of course nobody from Google would respond. Project demo is done, it's like olympic games. The person received his promotion and care less about the project than about life on Mars. Typical Google - launch and forget.
Can I get one to answer all the spam calls I get on my mobile phone? Something that strings the callers along for as long as possible?
You have to admit, the possible existence of life on Mars does actually seem more important than an automaton making a restaurant reservation.