digital assistant
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ChatGPT update allows it to remember who you are and what you like
One of the key tenets of this first wave of AI chatbots is that they don’t have continuous memory, meaning everything resets at the end of each conversation. OpenAI’s ChatGPT platform is changing this, however, as the bot will now remember who you are from conversation to conversation. This is both a tantalizing and risky prospect.
Mini's future cars will feature a dog as a digital assistant
Mini cars will soon have a digital assistant named Spike — and he's a dog.
Amazon is expanding the Astro's abilities for both home and business
Amazon's Astro robot is getting new skills for both home and business use. Our favorite: pet detection.
Alexa now allows you to move music among different devices with your voice
One of the more noteworthy features Amazon added this month is the ability to move music between Echo devices using your voice.
Apple has a new app for collecting feedback on Siri
In an effort to improve its digital assistant, the company recently launched a study to collect speech data and feedback with the help of an app called Siri Speech Study.
Siri will no longer have a 'default' voice in iOS 14.5
For as long as Apple has offered Siri, the digital assistant has defaulted to a female voice in North America. That’s about to change.
The only Cortana-powered speaker is about to lose Cortana
Harman Kardon has announced that it will soon release a software update that disables Cortana and turns the Invoke into a regular Bluetooth speaker.
Microsoft will shut down the Cortana iOS and Android apps in 2021
The company's first-generation Surface Headphones are also losing access to the current version of Cortana.
Microsoft will remove Cortana from its Android launcher in April
Some significant changes are coming to Cortana. Starting this spring, Microsoft said it plans to make productivity the focus of the digital assistant. As part of the shift, Cortana will lose some of its more consumer-facing features, such as the ability to play music and control smart home devices. More significantly, the company plans to remove the digital assistant from its Launcher app on Android.
You can tell Alexa to pay your bills (if you're in India)
Amazon Pay users in India can now ask Alexa to pay their utility, internet, mobile and TV bills, according to TechCrunch. Indian Amazon Pay users can take advantage of the cross-platform functionality with any Alexa-enabled device, not just first-party devices like the company's Echo smart speakers. This means even headphones with Alexa built-in support the functionality.
Apple rewrote Siri to dodge questions about feminism and #MeToo
Siri may be in favor of equality, but just don't call her a feminist. That's the gist of multiple internal Apple documents obtained by The Guardian that instruct employees to program the digital assistant to avoid and deflect questions about "sensitive topics" like feminism and the #MeToo movement. The documents date to June 2018 and were leaked to The Guardian by one of the contractors that worked for Apple's Siri "Grading" program, which the company suspended in August.
Samsung's Galaxy Note 10 doesn't have a headphone jack or Bixby button
Remember those Samsung ads mocking Apple's latest iPhones for not having a headphone jack? Well, it looks like the company is going to have to make some about itself. That's because, as leaks suggested, Samsung's new Galaxy Note 10 won't have one. Instead of a 3.5mm port, the smartphone will use USB-C for audio and basically anything else that requires physical connectivity. While the Note 10 comes with a pair of USB-C earbuds, the lack of a traditional 3.5mm jack means you'll need a dongle if you want to use your own, non-wireless headphones.
Hey Alexa: How can we escape surveillance capitalism?
Where do you go when you want to escape surveillance? When you want to stop feeling like you might be being listened to by microphones, or watched through surveillance cameras, or tracked by invisible tech gremlins burrowed within devices. Certainly nowhere in public. Perhaps it's your car. Maybe it's your home. Or even your bedroom? For some readers, that perimeter of personal freedom likely shrunk in February when news broke that Google "forgot" to tell consumers its Nest Secure came with a built-in microphone.
Android users can fire Google Now and replace it with Cortana
Microsoft recently unveiled plans to launch its Cortana digital voice assistant on arch-rival Google's Android OS, but until now, you could only use it as a standalone app. However, the latest beta (1.0.0.204) lets you activate Cortana instead of Google Now by pressing and holding your Android home button. That's a new way for Android users to test the app's friendly ways and be tempted away from the businesslike Google Now. Since Cortana relies on Bing, it's also a sneaky way for Microsoft to do an end-run around Google search.
Google reveals Now on Tap, its canny new Android M concierge
Google's trying to make Now even more subservient to your needs with its next version for Android M called Now on Tap. The new digital assistant listens in on your activities and gives you supplemental info like store hours or movie reviews right inside an app or web page. For instance, if a friend texts you with a dinner invite at a new restaurant, you can ask Now on Tap for reviews, hours and other info mid-conversation. It'll also create reminders on the fly about previous email or text discussions and incorporate detailed Knowledge Graph information.
Ask Ooloo puts the 'person' back in personal assistant
Before Google dominated search, Ask Jeeves depended on a team of humans -- yes, humans -- to answer your internet queries. Ultimately, search algorithms killed the internet's favorite butler, but the idea that humans are worthy competition for the software we create didn't follow him to the grave. Case in point: Ask Ooloo, a digital assistant powered by living, breathing human beings. According to Ooloo's makers, the PPDA (people-powered digital assistant) is staffed with "real people 24/7" ready to offer you quick, localized search results with a personal touch. All you have to do is speak your question, as you would with Google Now, Siri or Cortana, and wait for an answer. We put the iOS app to the test, asking it 'Who invented the Internet?" What it revealed, probably won't shock you.
Cortana won't sound like Cortana on UK Windows Phones
Now that Microsoft is rolling Windows Phone 8.1 out to handsets, users can now start chatting with its new virtual assistant, Cortana. Right now, she's limited to the US, but the Cortana man at Microsoft, Marcus Ash, has tweeted that "barring an unforeseen issue," the UK developer preview will go live in "less than two weeks" and, wait for it, not feature the reassuring tones of Jen Taylor, the original talent behind Halo's Cortana. Like Apple's Siri, Cortana will adopt a British accent when it rolls out, presumably to make owners feel more comfortable when interacting with the digital sidekick. Sure, she'll still take notes, dictate messages and offer up calendar alerts and reminders, she just won't sound like the Cortana you've relied upon during many a gaming session (unless you indulge in a bit of location trickery).
Leak: future iOS update to introduce Siri-based voice control
When Apple snatched up Siri back in April, we had to wonder exactly what Cupertino was planning for the voice controlled virtual assistant. The answer, according to a new leak, is unsurprisingly obvious: iOS integration. A screenshot leaked to 9to5Mac flaunts an "Assistant" feature presumably built into a firmware update. To back up the screenshot, the aforesaid site dove into the iOS SDK and uncovered code describing Siri-like use of the iPhone's location, contact list, and song metadata. The code also outlined a "speaker" feature, opening a door for further Nuance integration in Apple products. Sound awesome? Sure it does, but keep it salty: 9to5's source says the assistant feature only just went into testing, and may not be ready in time for Apple's next big handset upgrade. Hit the source link to see the code and conjecture for yourself.
Former Apple Store employee creates Iron Man's J.A.R.V.I.S. using a Mac mini
Okay, there's no HUD display like Tony Stark had and it isn't voiced by Paul Bettany, but former Apple Store employee Chad Barraford has created Project Jarvis, a digital assistant that greets him, Tweets for him, and can even tell his family when he has a headache and dim the lights of his apartment before he reaches home. Project Jarvis is based on the comic book character Edwin Jarvis, Tony Stark's human butler who became an AI construct after he was reinvisioned for a twenty-first century audience in the first Iron Man film. Chad's real life Jarvis may not help him fly an invisible suit of armor, but via RFID tags, webcams, and microphones, Barraford can communicate with Jarvis in a number of ways including tweeting, instant messaging, and speech recognition which allows him to control lights and appliances, notify him of breaking news, Facebook updates, Netflix queues, check stock quotes and weather, and even help assist him with cooking. Barraford calls Jarvis a digital life assistant (DLA) and runs it entirely from a four year-old Mac mini running custom AppleScript, he told us. Right now he has no plans to sell the AppleScript code, but is always happy to share ideas with other developers of DLAs. Click on over to The Boston Globe to see video of Jarvis in action.
DARPA-based Siri virtual assistant hits the App Store, smartphone sentience can't be far behind (video)
It's been well over six months since we first got wind of Siri, the DARPA-inspired smartphone app that pledged to take all the hassle out of... well... life. It's a virtual assistant that can take care of menial tasks, things like finding restaurants, hearing reviews, and even booking tables -- all with your voice. Siri asks simple questions and reacts to your answers, and while it sadly seems to have lost some of its military feel since its DARPA days (bummer), it's a lovely companion to your happening lifestyle. Plus it's free, and free is good! Check out a demonstration video after the break, and hit up the App Store to make with the download. Meanwhile, if you're on some other smartphone platform you'll have to wait. We fully expect Siri will break free of its current monotasking abode sometime in the future, but we don't know when. We just don't know when. %Gallery-84723%
