Google’s Personal Assistant Wants to Know All About You and Be Your BFF
Everybody has that friend that sends you articles they think you’ll like. Well, now Google’s Personal Assistant wants to be that friend. Google Now, AKA the Google search app, can already do the things that most digital assistants do: send you information about the weather, traffic and upcoming events. But with its latest experiment, it looks like the app wants to be more of a personalized personal assistant, like your know-it-all, Internet-enabled friend.
The new feature, “Explore Interests,” allows users to tell Google Now exactly what they’re into. Users will be able to track their favorite celebs, TV shows, branch of science, ingredient, whatever. So far, the test has been popping up on Android phones in a box titled “Get updates on your interests.” Once users select their interests, Google will track them, and any new information about those topics will pop up as a card in the app. It’s very similar to setting a Google Alert, except it doesn’t clog up your inbox.
The app already used users’ locations and search history to recommend news items, but “Explore Interests” will allow users a bit more control in what news Google will recommend they read.
The update is not official yet and Google told Tech Crunch that it “has nothing to announce.” So it’s just a test on certain Android phones at the moment, and we shouldn’t really expect to see it in the near future. At least we now know we have a bit of time to figure out how to hide all our personal information and interests from Google.
What do you think of the all-knowing personal assistant? Let us know @BritandCo!
(h/t Tech Crunch; photo via Getty)