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Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

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Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#191

Post by tlrobinson »

Svenskunganka wrote: post #161
punnerud wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To save CPU/GPU/TPU there should be a high-frequency sound, as in people can’t hear, so the computers talking to each other and switch to a faster way to communicate. If this is included you also have way to detect if you are talking to a bot/duplex.

Doesn't most carriers heavily "compress" the sound, removing all sounds/frequencies that a human can't hear, etc? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2A8q3XIhu0

Yes, but it could be very subtle and low bandwidth at first, and once both sides were convinced the other was a machine switch to a full speed screeching 56k modem [1].

Or just communicate "hey actually connect to this HTTP/XMPP/whatever address on the internet and we'll continue this from there"

1. Probably a bit slower, I've heard modern VoIP lines don't work well with traditional modems?

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#192

Post by jamesgeck0 »

monkeynotes wrote: post #180
ngold wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like this. So basically the old school modem sound, but in frequency that can't be heard. It would only take a fraction of a second to send out the feeler, and would not be noticed if a live human picked up. Could even detect a human and send the call over to a live representative without anyone noticing.

It doesn't have to be out of frequency (since that's probably filtered anyway), could be just a really quick burst handshake identifier which could encode an IP address to communicate over instead of a crummy phone line. Duplex: (I'm available to chat) Other bot: (Oh hai! Wanna get intimate?) Duplex: (Come find me on duplex://64.233.160.0)

As an end user, picking up the phone to hear a beep is not pleasant. I'm likely as not to immediately hang up, as I've come to associate beeps at the start of calls with scammers.

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#193

Post by dsjoerg »

minimaxir wrote: post #2

> The system also sounds more natural thanks to the incorporation of speech disfluencies (e.g. “hmm”s and “uh”s). These are added when combining widely differing sound units in the concatenative TTS or adding synthetic waits, which allows the system to signal in a natural way that it is still processing. (This is what people often do when they are gathering their thoughts.) In user studies, we found that conversation…

Similar to how when designing a virtual face, it looks more natural if it has some slight asymmetries and "defects", and when designing a synthetic drumbeat, if it's "perfect" it sounds totally robotic.

Imperfection is natural and comfortable. Perfect corners and edges are artificial and weird to the distracting point.

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#195

Post by ris »

strictnein wrote: post #52
kingnothing wrote: post #40

Google home's speech recognition can't even reliably turn my lights on and off every time, why would I trust it to book a restaurant reservation? I'd expect to tell it to book a 6pm table for 2 and wind up with an 8pm table for 10.

Listen to the audio examples. The person at the restaurant misheard the bot and repeated incorrect information back to it and it handled it in stride.

Should I be surprised that it happened to work in the example they decided to showcase in the release announcement?

I'm afraid I foresee this whole thing going quite hilariously wrong on the order of magnitude of Microsoft's Tay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tay_(bot)

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#196

Post by Klathmon »

Paul-ish wrote: post #190
Pfhreak wrote: post #176

A few observations: * In the example where Google asked about holiday hours -- they can now automate gathering information about businesses in bulk without having to rely on any APIs or user supplied info. Interesting thought experiment is Google validating their reviews/business listings by actually calling businesses and speaking to a real human. * This is going to be fantastic for accessibility. Maybe I struggle t…

> Google can scale out your requests, one to N. For example, 'Make me a reservation at a 4 star restaurant next Friday.' Google can immediately initiate calls against 15 restaurants and let you pick from the successes, then automatically cancel the reservations for the places you did not choose. This sounds like a nightmare for businesses. This time commitment asymmetry will be the issue with these systems. Like emai…

>This sounds like a nightmare for businesses.

They pointed out during the presentation that the system could call once to a business and get the hours, then allow hundreds or thousands of users to see that without bothering the business again. Assuming it works, it could save a significant amount of time for some places.

>If people use it to flake a lot, I could see businesses just not responding to the assistant.

Then it sounds like incentives are aligned here. Google needs to not allow users to abuse this ability so that businesses will trust and not block them.

If they allow something like the parent commenter pointed out, they would sour relationships with businesses who would promptly seek out ways to block or decline calls from this system.

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#198

Post by Paul-ish »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #12
politician wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the very least, there should be an requirement to identify when challenged. "Are you a bot?" "Yes, I am Google Duplex v1.2. This call is being recorded; you can see our privacy policy and terms of service at http://google.com/duplex."

I agree, but the social pressure not to use it would be immense. Imagine the awkward moments where we start confronting people who call us and asking them if they're real.

Perhaps they should identify themselves upfront? "Hello, this is an automated call on behalf of..."

Re: Google Duplex: An AI System for Accomplishing Real World Tasks Over the Phone

#199

Post by marnett »

CryptoPunk wrote: post #177
marnett wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What past productivity improvements and/or economic developments have ever pointed to your fantasy being realized? How will thousands of workers in the Philippines and India losing their call center jobs result in "higher and higher living standards?" I'm sorry but given historical context and popular capitalist intent, this future you speak of is simply fantastical. The working class would sooner be made extinct bef…

I recommend you look at the statistical evidence. The average wage in the developing world has doubled, and the global poverty rate has halved, over the last 20 years. That's all thanks to automation.

Well average wage is a poor metric. Hopefully it is median global household income that has doubled.

Taken to its logical extreme, there is no wage whatsoever if a majority of jobs are automated.

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