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'Gemini Is Replacing Google Assistant On Pixel Phones, and It's a Trainwreck' (fastcompany.com) 73

Posted by BeauHD from the ripping-the-bandage-off dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fast Company's Jared Newman: With its new Pixel 9 phones, Google Assistant is getting a demotion. In its place, Google's will ship Gemini as the default voice assistant on its flagship phones. Gemini uses large language models to interpret questions and generate answers, which means it can respond in a more conversational way. But while Google is eager to showcase Gemini as an answer to OpenAI's ChatGPT, tossing out Assistant is a mistake. Too often, Gemini fails at performing basic tasks, and it's going to cause lots of frustration for folks who depend on their phone's voice control features. Although Google says Gemini can now handle many of the same instructions as Assistant, that hasn't been my experience at all. As evidence, I submit a list of useful Google Assistant actions that either aren't possible or don't work properly with Gemini. Here is a summary of the challenges Gemini faces, as documented by Newman:

1. Local results are worse: Gemini provides less useful information for local business queries compared to Google Assistant, lacking context and formatting.
2. Gemini can't take notes: Unlike Google Assistant, Gemini cannot take voice notes or save them in an app like Google Keep.
3. No-can-do on to-do lists: Gemini does not support adding items to to-do lists, a feature that Google Assistant handles efficiently.
4. Weather doesn't work right: Gemini struggles with weather forecasts, often giving incorrect locations, unlike Google Assistant which works reliably.
5. Turn-by-turn directions don't load: Gemini fails to provide direct turn-by-turn navigation, only offering a preview, whereas Google Assistant launches navigation immediately.
6. Music and podcast requests are YouTube-only: Gemini only supports YouTube Music, unlike Google Assistant which supports multiple streaming services.
7. Video (in)capabilities: Gemini cannot directly access streaming apps for movies or shows, only suggesting content with no direct links.
8. No photo search: Gemini cannot search for photos in Google Photos, a task that Google Assistant can easily handle.
9. Bye-bye to a useful news feature: Gemini fails to play or provide recent news effectively, unlike Google Assistant's useful daily news briefing feature.
10. No Routines: Gemini does not support the automation of multiple actions through Routines, a feature present in Google Assistant.
11. So much for Shortcuts: Gemini lacks the Shortcuts feature available in Google Assistant, offering no replacement for quick actions in third-party apps.
12. A slower experience: Responses from Gemini are slower by a second or two compared to Google Assistant when answering queries.
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'Gemini Is Replacing Google Assistant On Pixel Phones, and It's a Trainwreck' More

'Gemini Is Replacing Google Assistant On Pixel Phones, and It's a Trainwreck'

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  • 13 (Score:5, Informative)

    by The MAZZTer ( 911996 ) <megazzt AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:12PM (#64707124) Homepage

    A few weeks ago I asked Google Assistant on my phone if it could identify a song from a fragment in a video I was watching on my PC, since my phone didn't seem to pick it up automatically.

    But it had been replaced by Gemini, which then proceeded to link me to an article which listed the exact steps I had just done to try and use Google Assistant to search for audio.

    • Something about this story is so relatable for many different situations we live everyday.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      It keeps offering to replace Google Assistant for me, and I keep declining. They have been making Assistant harder to activate, but it's still useful for setting reminders.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Calydor ( 739835 )

      This reads like something out of a standup routine.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by AvitarX ( 172628 )

      I think they're making assistant worse too.

      I can no longer turn my TV off by telling it to by typing into assistant.

      Now it just tells me it doesn't know what I want.

  • Assistant is just a toy anyway (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Original Curmudgeon ( 10281552 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:20PM (#64707142)

    Pfft - I gave up using Assistant for everything but the most routine tasks years ago, after I realized it was just not reliable enough to pin anything important in my life on it. It's basically a toy that has some cool features, which might work today, might not work tomorrow.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MeNeXT ( 200840 )

      I have no idea what the moderators are thinking. Assistant is terrible. Sometimes it gets it right but mostly it is more trouble especially when you need it most.

      I don't know how good Gemini is but assistant isn't a feature I rely on either.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward

        I'm guessing that mods know people that use it for real or are people that use it for real. They miss that it's just a different opinion.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      Gotta say, the "minus one I disagree" moderation is stronger than ever on slashdot. Assistant's unreliability is one thing google (and apple and amazon with siri and alexa) have worked for a long time to try to mitigate, and they're still very unreliable to this day. It's proven to be one of the problems where first 80% is pretty easy, so everyone gets excited that we're so close to 100%.

      And last 20 percent is incredibly hard, and getting exponentially harder with each fraction of a percent getting solved.

      • Gotta say, the "minus one I disagree" moderation is stronger than ever on slashdot.

        Funny you mention this, because I just pulled the "+1 Underrated" option out of my mod sheath today on a different article. I don't think I've had to use that more than a handful of times in what, 25 years? It was for a really anodyne comment that happened to be about a contentious topic. This guy had the misfortune of voicing his opinion early, thus got nailed with -1 moderation. I concur.

  • Author was born yesterday (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Lije Baley ( 88936 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:26PM (#64707154)

    And doesn't realize that "modern" replaced "functional" as the key measure of software over a decade ago.

    • I'd actually say 20 years rather than 10, certainly 15.

    • And doesn't realize that "modern" replaced "functional" as the key measure of software over a decade ago.

      Not quite. This isn't some useless UI change. This is a fundmental lack of functionality from a product that simply isn't ready yet. It's fun to shit on modern software development, but at least it's data driven providing the majority of users with the functionality they actually use as reported by telemetry, but this is just useless shit.

  • LLM's are the new Blockchain! (Score:4)

    by dschnur ( 61074 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:30PM (#64707162)
    Seriously. As we all know, blockchains have their use, but they are not good for everything. They will never replace ledgers and/or databases in all situations.

    LLM's (AI) are good for a few things, but there's *NO* way that the results of navigating through a mishmash of pre-trained data will ever be 100% accurate.

    LLM's are going to be with us for a while, but the use-cases are still tenuous at best.

    They are a perfect example of a sparkly new technology looking for a purpose that does not involve wasting the time of the user.

    • Seriously. As we all know, blockchains have their use, but they are not good for everything. They will never replace ledgers and/or databases in all situations.

      LLM's (AI) are good for a few things, but there's *NO* way that the results of navigating through a mishmash of pre-trained data will ever be 100% accurate.

      LLM's are going to be with us for a while, but the use-cases are still tenuous at best.

      They are a perfect example of a sparkly new technology looking for a purpose that does not involve wasting the time of the user.

      I think LLMs and generative models are far better than expert systems in answering queries that aren't programmed in or at least directly accessible in a database via a rules. Of course, that's sort of obvious. The problem is in expecting LLMs to be everything, which isn't true now and maybe never will be. Many of the tasks mentioned by the OP are obviously a bad fit for a generative model. I'm not sure why Google would make the mistake of thinking using Google Assistant and Gemini is exclusive, that on

    • I still haven't observed a use case for blockchain, other than facilitating criminal enterprises. For example, it's used to process ransomware payments. It's used to extract money from clueless "investors" (FTX, rug pulls). As an "investment," far more people have lost money than those who have made a profit, because it has turned out to be little more than a fancy Ponzi scheme.

      I have yet to see a legitimate problem that blockchain solves, that can't be solved equally well through more traditional technolog

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Pieroxy ( 222434 )

        You seem confused between blockchain and cryptocurrency. Blockchain is a decentralized digital ledger that securely records transactions across multiple computers, making the data transparent, immutable, and resistant to tampering.

        Even if this tool doesn't have value for you, it has for many.

        • I'm not confused about this at all, I realize that cryptocurrency is one system implemented using blockchain.

          My statement still stands. You talk about "many" who find value in this technology. Who, exactly? And do these other non-crypto systems accomplish anything that can't also be accomplished through other, more traditional means?

      • LLMs, by contrast, are a huge time saver. Just today I put together a slide deck walking through the ins and outs of XSLT. The slide deck needed a number of examples to illustrate the various techniques. Using Copilot, I was able to just ask it to write the code I wanted. It obliged, producing working code in a fraction of the time it would have taken me to do it manually. Copilot saves me time daily, in a hundred different ways. THAT is worth something.

        Yep, exactly. If you use the tool for something it's actually good at, and you use it intelligently, it's pretty awesome and useful.

    • Ah, but if you use them correctly...

      Example from today: I needed to write a semi-formal text going to several people on a project. One of those people was obstructive, making everyone else's lives that much harder. But the idiot is semi-important, so the message has to be clear, but not *too* direct. I gave ChatGPT my draft, which was too blunt, and explained what I wanted. Got back a great adaptation.

  • You can't even turn the old assistant back on anymore, because the second you go into the regular gemini app, to use gemini, even not as the assistant, it forces you to make gemini the assistant. It now sort of works when the screen is locked, but since you still have to say 'hey google' all of the other google devices in my house think I'm talking to them instead. More than useless because of all the things listed above. I think though, they have announced better integration, along with the Live Mode stuff

  • Don't forget the environment (Score:3)

    by SoonerSkeene ( 1257702 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:42PM (#64707190)
    Gemini also uses like a gallon of water and spews a ton of carbon into the air every time you use it.

  • Please don't make it creepy (Score:3)

    by Malay2bowman ( 10422660 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @08:47PM (#64707202)
    If it can answer questions like computers in Star Trek, fine. But I don't want to have a "conversation" with it. It's too damn creepy. We have too many human creepazoids who think they know the human mind and how people think, but they often get it very wrong and destroy people's lives. A lot of said creepazoids are deranged themselves. I wouldn't expect them to show any restraint , ethics, or even get things right when trying to create a 'human' AI.

  • Wow can you imagine the horror of relying on a hallucination-prone LLM to produce directions... hope there aren't any cliffs nearby with roads near the edge.

    What is really funny here though, is that Apple may very soon have a more capable assistant with them having a much more focused LLM managing the user requests! It would be quite a switch since until now the Google assistant has been better for most people. People seem happy with the beta so far (though it's not fully capable yet).

    • "Wow can you imagine the horror of relying on a hallucination-prone LLM to produce directions... hope there aren't any cliffs nearby with roads near the edge." Think how worse it will be in a self driving car. We already have problems with inaccurate hard coded GPS enabled maps and human drivers blindly following them.

  • Preview (Score:3)

    by Malay2bowman ( 10422660 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @09:02PM (#64707244)
    "5. Turn-by-turn directions don't load: Gemini fails to provide direct turn-by-turn navigation, only offering a preview, whereas Google Assistant launches navigation immediately." Just another thing to distract the driver that is probably a bit worse than reaching over to adjust the knobs on an old car radio. Why will I need a "preview" for something that should just work and give directions. Are they really that ditzed out that they are clueless about driving and how people use GPS maps?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by GrahamJ ( 241784 )

      Probably due to low confidence in having interpreted the user's request properly.

      • So if it was reading back what the user spoke as a destination "You said 'directions to the nearest Burger King', correct?" with the user acknowledging with a simple "Yes" I can understand. A car can be a noisy place where voices get jumbled. But if it's anything beyond that, it's not OK. The last thing we need is another thing to distract someone who is operating a 4,000+LB vehicle at high speed.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Torodung ( 31985 )

          This is true. I had to rent a Mazda CX30 when my Outlander broke down on an important week long car trip.

          The system was so goofed up (It had this weird combination joystick/dial thing and a variety of unintuitive buttons) that Android Auto was barely usable. This is not a good thing in a rental car, and I doubt even an experienced owner would not be significantly affected after learning the system. A warning pops up when you start up the header saying "Do not use this system if it will distract you from you

          • This makes me wonder if they did any kind of real world testing on that weird joystick thingies. The number 9ne rule should be to make the controls as intuitive and easy to operate as possible, and make them simple but not simplify them in the wrong way (putting a bazillion functions into one joystick in an attempt to reduce physical clutter). I really don't know how that one could've made it past the drawing board.

            • This makes me wonder if they did any kind of real world testing on that weird joystick thingies.

              Real world testing costs money. Of course it wasn't tested properly. Products are made for money.

    • Why will I need a "preview" for something that should just work and give directions.

      Leaving aside what is actually meant by preview here, literally all GPS apps including the ones in cars give you a preview precisely because there is no one clear decision to be made. The difference is most of them pick a default option after a timeout.

      "Hey Google, navigate to HomeDepot" - car suddenly instructs me to do a U-turn because the closest one is 1 mile behind me instead of selecting the one on the side of the highway currently on my path.

      Heck I drove a hired car for 9 months which when asked to "

      • a 5 day trip up to the extreme north in Norway? Wow, that would suck without a preview, I mean, with the number of clueless users who drive into lakes/the ocean, I imagine there are some who might complete day one of that drive and be like, "Gee, this doesn't look like anywhere near home?"
      • "Heck I drove a hired car for 9 months which when asked to "navigate home" would ask me to take a 5 day drive up to the tip of Norway since there was a "home" stored in the car and a "home" stored in my google account and it never confirmed which to use." "Home" could mean anywhere, and in this case I would expect it to ask me exactly which "home" I was referring too if it there more than one reference available to the system. . If I was driving a rental, one of the first things I would do is clear out the
    • well, that is odd... I mean, when I drive to someplace new, once I have concluded my business there, I simply say, "Hey Siri, take me home" and siri loads the apple map app and plots my route home in a preview, then I have to then select (or say) 'go', and it starts with the turn by turn directions, so far it has not steered me wrong in this, and I have been using Siri since before Apple bought it. It is convenient for when I am already driving and do not want to take the time to enter an address. I have al
      • "Why would M$ replace something with a new product with less functionality unless they are planning on creating a for pay app to replace those needed functions?" Taking away and then selling back the functions you once had. Isn't this considered a "bait and switch"?

  • That never works. Seems Google management is getting desperate and even more stupid than before.

  • Google currently has antitrust problems. I'm not sure they want to lock phone users to its AI.

  • Well ok (Score:4, Funny)

    by GrahamJ ( 241784 ) on Wednesday August 14, 2024 @11:16PM (#64707436)

    But aside from those dozen things it's sort of ok right?

    Ship it!

  • So people are actually using this shit? (Score:3)

    by jddj ( 1085169 ) on Thursday August 15, 2024 @01:09AM (#64707562) Journal

    I mean voice commands, whether assistant or Gemini?

    I want agency and control in my actions with any machine. I certainly don't want any part of Google to guess for me.

    Voice dictation is potentially useful - and I've tried it, but frankly, I don't like the phone spying on my every utterance, so I disable those parts of Android and kid myself it's not listening anyway.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AvitarX ( 172628 )

      I say or type for it to turn off my TV and/or living room lights when leaving the house or going to bed.

      Also pause what's on the TV.

  • Googlenomics: (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Thursday August 15, 2024 @01:19AM (#64707574) Journal

    Customer = Beta Tester

    • They learned that from Microsoft, of course.

      I firmly believe that "trust in AI" is the big technical problem of the next 5-10 years. And I don't see how we get to 'trust' without having a lot better understanding of how to -specify- an AI system's behaviors (must-do and must-not-do.)

    • i wish I had mod points, you'd get one from me for sure.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Torodung ( 31985 )

      It's worse than that. The reason, IMO, these systems are being pushed so hard is that they are unfinished until they are pounded at by millions of users as LLM training data. They need us to use it. We're not beta testers, we're development staff.

      They want to pay people for that, fine. There's no way I'm performing that service, on half-finished garbage that can't be used effectively, to finish the unfinished project.

      It's needed labor that they don't want to pay for. They can, but why not sucker a bunch of

  • Do people really use this stuff?

    I turn things like Assistant/Siri right off.

    The most I do is ask my car radio to call someone, other than that it's like BSG with me. All "hands-on".

    • The most I do is ask my car radio to call someone

      You are not paranoid enough my friend. The car downloaded all of your info from your phone and is sending that information out to build a profile about you for insurance and marketing purposes.

      Turn it ALL off.

  • Clearly a mandate from the sky, purely a management issue. Spending too much time on the golf course grousing about WFH and not enough time on basic competence.

  • The Gemini that you can download on your current phones is very different from the system that is installed on the Pixel 9 phones. Yes, the downloadable app is very limited, in the ways described. But, on the Pixel 9 phones, it can handle all of those functions, and more, because they are still keeping Google Assistent but augmenting it with Gemini in a way that can't be done with just the downloadable app on other phones. So, this entire diatribe, in relation to the Google Pixel 9 phones, is ludicrous a

  • and it's a real piece of crap.

    Seriously, not only the answer are weak or false, but the voice (in french-canadian) is so bad, and no way to change it.

    That a real ... for google

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Torodung ( 31985 )

      Yeah. I ran out and got an S23+ because I was afraid AI would be mandatory on an S24.

      Is it? I'm getting AI features pushed at me, but they're completely optional.

  • Please? I don't use assistant either and wish I could get rid of the search bar on the phone I have never once used. I don't want to install a 3rd party launcher I will also never use either.

  • In typical Google fashion, they aren't bothering to improve their existing product (Assistant) they're creating a competing product for something they already have (see messages / hangouts / wallet / music / etc...)

    Sure, let's force a less-capable alternative on hundreds of millions of people, break all existing documentation, and tell them they should be happy to have it. That'll earn us $billions$ !

  • Black Nazis (Score:3)

    by Salo2112 ( 628590 ) on Thursday August 15, 2024 @12:25PM (#64708742)
    Isn't this the AI that generated photos of n\Nazis as Black people? Why would anyone expect it not to suck?
  • Or perhaps even just updating OS's to a new major version. You would think this lesson would have been learned by now. Wow , great looking, shiny new excel with a nice Toolbar , oh wait VB tools are gone.

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