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Google has demonstrated an AI assistant that can make phone calls on your behalf, speaking to the human on the other end of the line. The company showed off the capability by playing a recording of a phone call it claims was between its chatbot and a hair salon:
Onstage at I/O 2018, Google showed off a jaw-dropping new capability of Google Assistant: in the not too distant future, it's going to make phone calls on your behalf. CEO Sundar Pichai played back a phone call recording that he said was placed by the Assistant to a hair salon. The voice sounded incredibly natural; the person on the other end had no idea they were talking to a digital AI helper. Google Assistant even dropped in a super casual "mmhmmm" early in the conversation.
Pichai reiterated that this was a real call using Assistant and not some staged demo. "The amazing thing is that Assistant can actually understand the nuances of conversation," he said. "We've been working on this technology for many years. It's called Google Duplex."
There is already a debate about whether this is a good idea:
The selfishness of Google Duplex
Google's AI sounds like a human on the phone — should we be worried?
Google Duplex: Good or Evil?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @03:29AM (8 children)
The robots came for the factory jerbs, and there's a robot technician training program at the local community college. Of course, there will be far fewer robot technicians than manual laborers. (Thus freeing up plenty of time, all of which the working class has generously donated to the ruling class in gratitude. It must be voluntary, because only filthy, lazy hippies like teachers organize to assert their ownership of the freed time.)
The robots have almost come for the driving jerbs. Now the robots come for the call center jerbs. Just imagine how much more free time the working class will have to donate to their betters!
dumb fucks
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @03:35AM (7 children)
Why won't the poor people just die. No living person earns $13 per hour. That's pocket lint money. At $13 per hour you're just dying in slow motion. Poor people should solve poverty by killing themselves quickly and as soon as possible.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @03:43AM (3 children)
$13 an hour, 20 hours a week is more than enough to fund rent, food, internet, and bus fare. Just don't get sick or injured.
(Score: 4, Funny) by realDonaldTrump on Friday May 11 2018, @05:33AM (2 children)
We have to take care of people. If you can’t take care of your sick in the country, forget it, it’s all over. I believe in universal healthcare. I'm a conservative on most issues but a liberal on this one. We should not hear so many stories of families ruined by healthcare expenses.
As far as single payer, it works in Canada. It works incredibly well in Scotland. Doctors might be paid less than they are now, as is the case in Canada, but they would be able to treat more patients because of the reduction in their paperwork.
A friend of mine was in Scotland recently. He got very, very sick. They took him by ambulance and he was there for four days. He was really in trouble, and they released him and he said, "Where do I pay?" And they said, "There’s no charge." Not only that, he said it was like great doctors, great care. I mean we could have a great system in this country.
The Canadian plan also helps Canadians live longer and healthier than Americans. There are fewer medical lawsuits, less loss of labor to sickness, and lower costs to companies paying for the medical care of their employees. If the program were in place in Massachusetts in 1999 it would have reduced administrative costs by $2.5 million. We need, as a nation, to re-examine the single-payer plan, as many individual states are doing.
Believe me, I am going to take care of everybody. I don't care if it costs me votes or not. Everybody's going to be taken care of much better than they're taken care of now.
(Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Friday May 11 2018, @06:48AM (1 child)
We have to take care of people. If you can’t take care of your sick in the country, forget it, it’s all over.
Its not over til the fat lady sings (Madame La Guillotine).
If you fuck the poor, they have a big incentive to kill you. If they are in danger of dying, they have nothing to lose.
This is not news - its already happening.
You might want to read up on the French Revolution, Al Quaida, Boko Haram, ISIS, etc.
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @01:24PM
Hmm. I am not well versed in the events of the 18th and 19th century in Europe. Is the French revolution unlike the others listed? My naïve understanding might have me list the American Revolution beside Al Quaida, Boko Haram, and ISIS as revolutions that came about with foreign material aid (France in the former most case, USA in the 3 latter cases). Did the French Revolution have substantial foreign material support?
So I suppose I must take your advice and do some reading.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @05:13AM (1 child)
So, basically, those horrible luddites were right, in the end.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 11 2018, @01:46PM
It could also be that the Luddites suffered a massive capitalist propaganda campaign to portray their protest over low wages and the alienation from production inherent in factory labor (sometimes expressed contrapositively with terms such as workmanship, seems to me) as an anti-technology movement, which misses the larger impetus of engaging in acts of sabotage (given the etymology suggesting the word is derived from the act of throwing wooden shoes into factory equipment¹) being the desire for a workers' revolution.
¹ Wikipedia disagrees [wikipedia.org] with this etymology: "It is sometimes said that some workers (from Netherlands for some, canuts from Lyon for others, luddites in England, etc.) used to throw their wooden shoes, called "sabots" (clogs) in the machines to break them, but this is not supported by the etymology."
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday May 11 2018, @04:47PM
Because assisted suicide is illegal. That's why.
In civilized countries we don't want people ending their miserable existence bringing a premature end to their pain and suffering.
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