With a feature called Duet AI in Google Workspace, Google has begun incorporating new artificial intelligence technology into some of its most widely used tools.
Duet AI for Gmail and Docs will let you let Google draft emails and word processing documents based on short text prompts, Google said in an announcement Wednesday. Google I/O developer conference. CEO Sundar Pichai demonstrated the “help me write” feature in response to the airline’s customer service message. First a terse response, then a more verbose alternative designed to appear more serious.
“Simply enter your wishes into the full refund request email, hit create, and you’ll be presented with a complete draft. Conveniently pulled in flight details from previous emails,” Pichai said at a press conference. “In this case, sending a more polite email may increase your chances of receiving a refund.”
A text prompt also creates a spreadsheet in Google Sheets. For example, a chart for a pet service provider to track customers and their dogs. And to spice up your presentation, Google Slides will now be able to generate images based on your text prompts.
These capabilities exemplify what is possible with modern “generative” AI, bringing a new creative dimension to the machine learning technology that has been in development over the past decade. Generative AI, especially his ChatGPT from OpenAI, sparks the imagination of people with creative or productive uses such as poetry writing and programming. Generative AI is also terrifying school administrators who anticipate a new era of fraud, as computers wipe out white jobs such as tax advisors and paralegal assistants. It raises concerns that
Google’s new tool isn’t available yet, but Google has set up a waitlist for Workspace Labs that you can sign up for. Since the company first started talking about the product in March, it has increased the number of “trusted testers” to try it out.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai unveils AI-powered ‘Help me write’ feature coming to Gmail and Google Docs with ‘Write a thank you note’ and ‘Write a job description for a textile designer’ , can be turned into draft documents. .
Google
At a briefing about the feature, Aparna Papp, GM of Google Workspace Productivity Tools, said, “I’m really blown away by the really interesting, smart, and creative things people are doing with this feature. I will,” he said. This includes writing job applications, letters of recommendation, essays, and formal post-interview thank you notes.
The “Duet” label shows how tech companies are positioning AI as an assistant that enhances what users do, including autocorrect and enhanced grammar checking. In fact, Google rival Microsoft calls its own AI-powered productivity tools Microsoft 365 Copilot. Like Duet AI, Copilot has undergone limited testing.
Google plans to let people roll the dice a little bit with “help me write”, and the new version of the long-standing “I feel lucky” button is a voluntary effort by the company’s search engine. Pap added that it adds a bit of randomness.
“Sometimes you try it and you get a haiku, other times you get an email with a pirate voice,” she says. “It’s a little bit of fun.”
