Why Google believes machine learning is its future

Enlarge / Google CEO Sundar Pichai speaks during the Google I/O Developers Conference on May 7, 2019. (credit: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

One of the most interesting demos at this week’s Google I/O keynote featured a new version of Google’s voice assistant that’s due out later this year. A Google employee asked the Google Assistant to bring up her photos and then show her photos with animals. She tapped one and said, “Send it to Justin.” The photo was dropped into the messaging app.

From there, things got more impressive.

“Hey Google, send an email to Jessica,” she said. “Hi Jessica, I just got back from Yellowstone and completely fell in love with it.” The phone transcribed her words, putting “Hi Jessica” on its own line.