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

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171–180 of 786 posts

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

#171

Post by BinaryIdiot »

Denvercoder9 wrote: post #123
tanilama wrote: post #67

This is awesome, But The algorithm of cause doesn't understand all contexts. What troubles me is that, in the first example, should we really give algorithm the freedom to propose a new date for an appointment? It reminds me one thing that particular bothers me with the Gmail's smart reply feature, where when given Monday or Wednesday as options, the suggested reply is, 'How about Tuesday', which does make the conver…

I'd expect you to be able to give Duplex the range of dates and times where you're available (or let it get the info from your Google Calendar).

Exactly this. I put together a rough demo of similar AI scheduling in the past and x.ai does this as well. The AI works within a given constraint before proposing new times because the idea is to free up time for you, not make you clean up a scheduling mistake every time something is decided by the AI.

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

#172

Post by justonepost »

cromwellian wrote: post #128

The people losing their marbles over this being some kind of Turing Test passing distopian stuff are missing the point at how limited this domain is. People who answer phones to take bookings perform an extremely limited set of questions and responses, that’s why they can even be replaced by dumb voice response systems in many cases. In these cases, the human being answering the phone is themselves acting like a bot…

The problem is that computers will now be interacting with people and people will become unsure of whether they are taking to a computer or a person. It will create a bewildering world full of mistrust. I would argue that there should be a law proclaiming that computers must identify themselves.

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

#173

Post by chime »

spdustin wrote: post #155

> [...] we trained Duplex’s RNN on a corpus of anonymized phone conversation data. That's alarming, and thinly cloaked in euphemism (IMO). "Conversation data" here means recordings of actual human-to-human calls, as well as their automated transcriptions. Both were used. Where did that source audio come from?

For years, Google had a 1-800 free 411 service. Even a decade ago it was expected that they would use that data for AI.

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

#174

Post by carapace »

comboy wrote: post #138
guiomie wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you handle deepfakes? This is much more disturbing than what is in the post, and it isn't a corporation who built it. I don't think this has anything to do with regulating google.

The reality changes. Fast. You won't be able to trust photos, audio recordings, or videos. You will be able to trust digital signature. To have any opinion whether information about somebody else is real you will need a working web of trust. It's gonna be a great thing and I can't wait for it. It's going to change news, politics and in general the world we live in. It's going to be bigger than the Internet but way mo…

Web of Trust and Reputation Networks.

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

#175

Post by mrtksn »

sgslo wrote: post #110

This is one end-game of AI - changing the economics of scams. Imagine how a 'long con' works today: a scammer befriends a person online through a video game or social platform, and develops a rapport with them over the span of days, weeks, months. After some trust has been gained, the scammer then requests money from the victim. Does this happen a lot today? I don't know, but certainly one reason it doesn't is the ec…

Well, I'm already receiving automated calls about "that car accident" and they connect me to a real person if I happen to respond with a predefined keyword.

I would say that there's a market for that. How long before rough agents implement good AI for their operations? How long before we implement defences against AI?

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

#176

Post by Pfhreak »

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 to speak, and I want a reservation. I can have the machine do the irritating work, and focus on just having a nice meal or getting a service (like a haircut).

* 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.

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

#177

Post by CryptoPunk »

marnett wrote: post #162
arikr wrote: post #5

This is amazing! I'm very excited for a future where more and more tasks can be automated, enabling humans to get higher and higher living standards with the same/fewer input resources. In short, technology is a wonderful thing that allows very low marginal costs. This is what we need to make the future a better place, given a consistent or growing population. "Technology is miraculous because it allows us to do more…

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.

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

#179

Post by floatrock »

justonepost wrote: post #172
cromwellian wrote: post #128

The people losing their marbles over this being some kind of Turing Test passing distopian stuff are missing the point at how limited this domain is. People who answer phones to take bookings perform an extremely limited set of questions and responses, that’s why they can even be replaced by dumb voice response systems in many cases. In these cases, the human being answering the phone is themselves acting like a bot…

The problem is that computers will now be interacting with people and people will become unsure of whether they are taking to a computer or a person. It will create a bewildering world full of mistrust. I would argue that there should be a law proclaiming that computers must identify themselves.

They're not unaware of this concern. From the article:

> The Google Duplex technology is built to sound natural, to make the conversation experience comfortable. It’s important to us that users and businesses have a good experience with this service, and transparency is a key part of that. We want to be clear about the intent of the call so businesses understand the context. We’ll be experimenting with the right approach over the coming months.

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

#180

Post by monkeynotes »

ngold wrote: post #169
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.

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)

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