Google Voice Search Just Got Better

[WenWM]

Google is a great company, in a way that they have the ability to not only create new ideas and software, but even improve it to a new level no one would’ve otherwise thought of. Their latest and greatest update is to one of the better features on our Android devices, the voice search feature. This update makes it more personal in the way that it keeps track of what you like searching for and so you get better results and it is more accurate.
Here is how they put it:

When we launched Voice Search more than two years ago, we wanted it to “just work” right out of the box, without an initial setup process. And so, we built speech models broad enough to accommodate a wide variety of people, regardless of gender, age, and accents, or variations in pitch, pace, and other factors. But we always knew we could build a more accurate model by listening to your voice, and learning how you -- as a unique individual -- speak. So today we’re launching personalized recognition.


If you opt into personalized recognition, we begin to associate the recordings of the words that you ask us to recognize with your Google account. We then automatically use these words to build a speech model specifically for you. This speech model enables us to deliver greater recognition accuracy. Although subtle, accuracy improvements begin fairly quickly and will build over time.

The first time you use Voice Search, you’ll be presented with a dialog to turn on personalized recognition. Google takes your privacy seriously, so you can enable or disable personalized recognition at any time through the Google voice recognition settings on your phone. If you’d like to disassociate your voice recordings from your Google Account, you can do so through the Google Dashboard in the Speech section.

The personalized recognition functionality is currently available for English in the United States. We plan to support other countries and languages in the near future. To enable it, you must have Android 2.2 or higher, and download the latest version of the Voice Search app from Android Market. The new app also includes some improvements to name recognition and speed, especially over 3G and EDGE connections.

So go ahead and download the latest Voice Search app, and let’s get personal!

 

[Sweettooth]

That means keep your voice searches clean folks, because Google is storing audio records of everything you speak into the device. We all know there's no such thing as privacy when you're sending/receiving data over the internet, not to mention having that data stored in an unknown location.

 

[patfactorx]

I swear that VOice Search is already built in to train to your voice but maybe its training me!

 

[RW-1]

IMHO, I thought it did a fine job to begin with, as long as I spoke cleanly/clearly ...

This will be a good update, in addition to the other bug fixes in it.

The question negs, if you dissassociate your recording with your google account, good luck, because that option mentioned isn't there yet.

 

[barrettrking]

I guess storing the sound of my voice isn't too much creepier than storing my internet searches. There's a trade-off here, folks. If you want privacy, you can't have the convenience. And so vice versa, if you want convenience, you can't have the privacy (at least not if you're using Google apps).

They way I rationalize it for myself is by considering that Google as a whole doesn't care what I'm doing, they only care about the data that I give them, because they want to target ads at me.

 

[EvilDobe]

This article is rather amusing to me. Not because of the content but because yesterday I thought to myself "man Voice Search ***** pisses me off... there has to be a way to make this better." Low and behold I found this article & got excited. Not sure why I got so excited but I did... probably my cynical low expectations. Sure they're tracking our voice patterns... but who cares? They're already tracking our e-mails, phone calls, chat records, location, data usage, etc... what's one more thing? I may even sign up for the Google Chip Implant if they release it. Who am I? No one. If they care to track what I'm doing... pfft... whatever.