technology news: Google Duplex can now buy movie tickets for you in Chrome

mardi 1 octobre 2019

Google Duplex can now buy movie tickets for you in Chrome

Google IO 2019 Sundar Pichai duplex

Google announced Duplex at last year's Google I/O event. This year, Google announced it would soon release Duplex on the web, which promises the same Duplex AI automation but for online forms instead of over phone calls.

We now know Google is finally releasing its Duplex on the web implementation (via Android Police). Google has confirmed Duplex is rolling out for many movie ticket booking websites like AMC and Fandango in Chrome.

Duplex on the web release Android Police

Searching for movie tickets within Google Search will give users the option to buy tickets with Google Assistant. From here, Duplex takes over, requiring minimal input from the user.

Duplex will bring the user to the ticket website they have chosen. A persistent Google Assistant overlay sits on top of the site throughout the whole process. When prompted, users will interact with the Assistant overlay to select how many tickets they want. Users will still need to interact with the website itself to select tickets.

The Assistant overlay handles the payments, and most forms are filled out automatically with information the user has saved in Google. This makes the whole process of buying movie tickets much faster and simpler than before.

This process will look a little different every time the user takes advantage of it. Google touts Duplex on the web as a "live" experience. That means it responds in real-time to what is on the screen.

Duplex is just one small piece in the bigger Google Assistant picture. Whether turning on lights, setting reminders, making phone calls, or now filling out forms on the web, Google is making the interaction between humans and technology as simple as possible.

Thus far, Google Assistant has been widely successful at achieving this. It looks like Duplex on the web could share in this success as it releases to more users, but we can't say for sure until Google fleshes it out a little more and brings it to other services and websites.