Google showcases AI advances at its big conference

Ryan Nakashima
California, US.- Google is again putting artificial intelligence in the spotlight at its annual developers conference Tuesday.

The company opened its I/O event with literal bells and whistles at the outdoor Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California — showing off what it’s like to experiment with artificially intelligent synthesizers and inviting thousands of people to participate in an AI drawing game.

The company’s digital concierge, known only as the Google Assistant, is gaining new abilities to handle tasks such as making restaurant reservations and placing other tedious phone calls without human hand-holding.

“Hi, I’m calling to book a hair appointment for a client,” said a realistic-sounding automated voice in a demo from the conference stage. The AI voice used pauses and “ums” and “mmmhmms” to sound more human during interactions with people. The company said it is rolling out the technology, called Google Duplex, as an experiment in coming weeks.

“We really want to work hard to get this right,” Pichai said. The company is also introducing an autocomplete feature in its Gmail email service that uses machine learning to offer suggested ways to finish sentences users start typing.