{"id":111161,"date":"2018-10-16T21:57:56","date_gmt":"2018-10-16T21:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sftarticles.wpenginepowered.com\/en\/?p=111161"},"modified":"2025-07-01T22:52:57","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T05:52:57","slug":"there-is-a-lot-more-to-google-assistant-than-you-think","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/there-is-a-lot-more-to-google-assistant-than-you-think\/","title":{"rendered":"There is a lot more to Google Assistant than you think"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Google<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve all spoken to an AI assistant at some point. From Alexa to Bixby via Google Assistant, AI helpers have found their way into our lives in a number of guises. You can find Alexa in a microwave<\/a> and many people have even made the creepy move of inviting AI assistants, equipped with video cameras and microphones into their bedroom. What is behind the AI algorithms though? How have we found ourselves in a dimension where people are building relationships with machines? Well, there is a lot more going on than you\u2019d believe.<\/p>\n

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Who is Google Assistant? A deeper look at her backstory and personality<\/h2>\n

It isn\u2019t easy making a robot sound human. In order to make its AI assistant sound as human as possible, Google went to great lengths coming up with a surprisingly detailed backstory for its “personality.”<\/strong> The job was given to James Giangola, who is a conversation and persona designer. It was Giangola\u2019s job to come up with the person Google wanted to put into their little boxes. In a recent interview with The Atlantic<\/a>, he let out a few secrets from her life.<\/p>\n

Apparently, Google Assistant’s persona is supposed to be that of the youngest daughter of a research librarian and physics professor.<\/strong> She went to Northwestern where she gained a B.A. in art history. The details get even more finely tuned as Assistant won a massive $100,000 on the kid\u2019s edition of “Jeopardy” when she was a child. Later, she worked as an assistant to a popular late TV comedian.<\/p>\n

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Google wants to turn you into an emoji<\/p>\r\n Check it out \u25ba<\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n

Does this all sound like the person behind the voice when you ask Google what the weather will be like? What you hear is an actor\u2019s interpretation of the backstory created by Giangola.<\/strong> It was the actors\u2019 job to take the story and bring it to life in their auditions for the Google Assistant role. Every detail of the story was important, with Giangola adding instances to the story specifically to add audible traits to the voice he wanted Assistant to have. In the Atlantic piece, he talks of one poor actor being turned down because her reading of the part didn\u2019t contain the energy he\u2019d associate with somebody who likes to kayak.<\/strong> Yep, Google Assistant is an avid kayaker too.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just Giangola who was busy fine-tuning Assistant\u2019s personality either. Google also brought in Pixar\u2019s Emma Coats who was a storyboard artist on “Brave,” “Monsters University,” and “Inside Out.” For Coats, the number one rule for Google Assistant was that it needs to sound like a human, but never pretend to be one.<\/strong> This is\u00a0why if you ever ask Assistant questions about its own preferences or experiences the answers will always be evasive. A piece of software can\u2019t have a favorite food, so it shouldn\u2019t act like it does.<\/p>\n

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You can’t marry a piece of software so Google Assistant needs to avoid the question in a way that sounds human<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This last point from Coats makes you wonder whether she was consulted about Google Duplex. One of Assistant\u2019s bold new skills announced at Google\u2019s latest I\/O conference was the ability to make appointments for you, even if they needed to be made over the phone.<\/strong> Onlookers in the hall and on the internet were aghast as hairdressers and restaurant staff were led to believe they were taking a booking from a human, when in fact they were talking to Google Assistant. Duplex is currently in line for a limited release but may receive a wider roll-out if it declares itself as an AI Assistant before getting back to sounding as human as possible.<\/p>\n

All this adds up to the voice you hear back when you shout out, “Hey Google.” A lot of work has gone into making Assistant sound relatable, fun, energetic, and most of all human. As soon as she starts trying to make you think she’s human, however, you\u2019ll know that something must be up.<\/p>\n\n

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More about Google Assistant<\/p>\r\n

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Complete list of \u201cOK Google\u201d commands for Google Assistant \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n \r\n

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Google Assistant just got a lot better \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n

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The essential guide to Google Assistant \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n \r\n

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Has your Google Assistant been creeping you out? \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A deeper look at Google Assistant\u2019s backstory and personality<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9073,"featured_media":111169,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[1015],"tags":[1401,2610,1068,1441],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-111161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-ai","tag-app-subdomain-redirectiongoogle-assistant","tag-google","tag-google-assistant"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9073"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111161"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111161\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":327197,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111161\/revisions\/327197"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111161"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=111161"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=111161"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=111161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}