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Ryan Hoover

Google Home - Google's Alexa competitor, an in-home voice assistant

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Google Home is your home assistant, controlled by your voice. You can ask whatever is on your mind from playing some music, or just a curious question to some hands-free shopping. It will be glad to assist you and your needs. It comes in three different sizes and four colors to match your interior and pairs with your smart home.

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Ryan Hoover
Hunter
Rumors are true. I'm currently watching the livestream, details unfolding now.
Daniel Lee
@rrhoover Powered by Google Assistant?
Ryan Hoover
Hunter
Cheaper than I expected
Calum Webb
@rrhoover Cheers Ryan!
Ryan Hoover
Hunter
Launch partners:
vipul mishra
@rrhoover Interesting. 4 out of these partners are from India.. :)
Ben Tossell
Who will be the first to get Alexa and Google home to have a conversation?
Simon Burns
@bentossell Viral video countdown stars now...
Tom Parish
@bentossell good one Ben. And when that happens, what will they learn from each other. Fascinating thought.
Alan Cassinelli
curious to see how it differs from Amazon's Alexa. Google doesn't have a great track record of hardware products
Jon Jones
@alancassinelli I'm also curious to see how this ties into OnHub in the long term. I remember the initial teardown of that showed that it had a microphone and other hints that it might be a way to sneak an Echo-like Google device into the home in the guise of a router, but I never heard anything more about it.
Nick Matarese
@jonjones there is actually no microphone inside of either OnHub.
Jon Jones
@nmatares Ah, thanks for the reply! I must have misremembered.
Arthur Rodriguez
@jonjones @alancassinelli I fear OnHub might be another abandonment.
Jon Jones
@artyrodrigo @alancassinelli That's a shame if so. I'm an early adopter for nearly every Google product or service I can get my hands on, and my latest in a string of disappointments was their discontinuing the Google Wallet card.
Niv Dror
it's thinking
Andrew Richard
@nivo0o0 #lol google home is doing some deep machine learning algorithm to turn on the light, loving the colors
Alex Shak
@nivo0o0 Audience testing showed that HAL9000 would have looked much friendlier if he'd gone for a spectrum of four dots.
Adam Loving
I wish it was also a lava lamp.
Ben Lang
Top Product
Nice URL guessing work @jackdweck, very impressive 👌 https://twitter.com/jackdweck/st...
Joshua Decker
That commercial with the family was creepy as fuuuuuuu. I do NOT want that in my house. They were like zombies and couldn't even do anything without talking to Google. Then they showed the whole family totally forgetting about their kids space day at school. Creepy and sad... played like an SNL parity skit.
Justin Mitchell
@jdbt Ha that's pretty funny considering everyone said the EXACT same thing about the Echo commercial. It's interesting that no one has figured out how to "sell" the idea yet.
Joshua Decker
@itsthisjustin this was worse though from what I remember. In literally felt sorry for those kids.
Ryan Marr
egh.... So torn. I love my echo dot, but the "play in all rooms" is a pretty great feature that Alexa is missing. It's weird to say but living with Alexa I have an emotional connection to ...erhm her.... Switching to google would feel like cheating on a spouse.
Jaswinder Brar
It would be great if this new Google Home technology incorporated a bluetooth headset featuring a microphone.. Thanks, Jaswinder Brar
Ryan Hoover
Hunter
I unboxed my Google Home last night. Here are my first impressions: - The Google Home speaks very clearly and sounds natural... for a robot woman. - I wish I could change the nickname. "OK, Google" is long. Alternatively, you can say "hey, Google" but I'd prefer a single syllable name if possible. - My favorite (obvious use case) is playing music, but I also find it useful asking Google for the weather and my day's itinerary (thanks to Google Calendar integration). Curious to hear about other peoples' experience so far.
Dan Flanegan
@rrhoover Did you have an Echo previously? My Echo has been used primarily to 1 - Turn on my Hue lights 2 - Play music from spotify 3 - Play my news briefing 4 - Tune into Bay Area news radio when I am in SoCal And that is about it. I would hope that what Google Home would provide is a more tightly integrated experience with other google services.. mail, maps, calendar etc. And decrease the odds of making accidental purchases (almost happened with the Echo)
Katie Mui
@rrhoover I received mine on Monday after patiently waiting for the coloured bases – glad I did because the copper base is a thing of beauty. We fitted our 1-bedroom apartment with a few Philips Hue bulbs two years ago but were using them as intended very minimally (turning one floor lamp on/off because it didn't have a wall switch) so we were amazed when the voice command just... worked. Setup was so easy and quick. We have a couple of WeMo appliances and switches lying around so we'll set those up soon. We're finding it hugely useful for checking nutrition info – my SO is diabetic so it's handy to be able to get the amount of carbs and sugar without having to whip out a phone or computer. I think Google Home is lacking a lot of functionality but I'm eagerly awaiting updates. I have no doubt it's only going to get better and better. Immediate things on my wishlist: - multiple accounts - recognizing commands for more than one room - automatic reminders based on calendar and email - add/edit calendar - more partners/services (other ride share options, Amazon shopping cart (a girl can dream), Rinse, etc) - stop giving me music "that will get me laid"!!! (I blame this on Spotify...) One last thing: Our living room TV was handed down by the previous tenant so it's not a smart TV... which is a huge issue, especially since it's mounted on the wall. I'm prepared to buy the SmartThings Hub (I read ifttt is slow) and Harmony Hub to get my TV working with Google Home but the other roadblock is that Sony refuses to let PS4 function as a media center. This means that users have very limited non-controller functionality and Netflix, Amazon Video & Hulu does not work with Harmony Hub. (The conundrum is that PS3 allows non-controller use of Netflix and Amazon Video.) Xbox One/One S and Roku are the only players that support all three, since Google won't open up ChromeCast to Amazon Video. Soooooo I guess I have to buy an Xbox or a new TV... But even then that means getting from Google Home to Netflix is a 4-device process.
Dan Flanegan
@continents looks gorgeous
Ryan Hoover
Hunter
@continents nutritional info is a great use case, especially for diabetics. Love the copper base!
Steve Harman
I wonder if this is set to remain US only, in the same way Alexa?
Seth Wang
After the keyboard war, voice assistant war begins.
Daniel Scherrer
@sethwang10 I would even go out and say: after search engine war, because this replaces the whole thing...
Martin Kessler
Want...! But already have two Alexas.... hmmm!
Hope Atina
@kesslerio another one
✎ Andrew Warner
Yes, but wheeeeeeeen?
Laurie DesAutels
If Google makes a solid hardware that is user friendly then I see this as a huge threat to Alexa.
Alfonso C. Betancort
Everyone wants to talk to a "what ever" connected, but how many continue talking to their couple, kids, neighbors… lonely world that we have become.
Matt
Product Hunt needs to add pricing to the top level
rahul gupta
I hope it's at least a router!
Aaron Ng
Was thinking about getting an Echo but wasn't really sure what I'd use it for other than controlling some smarthome stuff and asking about the weather. Way more excited about Google Home– voice commands tied into Google Now and all your Google services is gonna be a winner.
Şerban Cârjan

I've actually had it for several months. I didn't get to play around with it too much, but for now its main use is with Google Music. I ask it to play songs, bands, albums or just generic stuff like "saturday morning music" and it's pretty good at it. I also ask it the weather, I occasionally set reminders on it and once or twice I set a countdown. I guess I'm not yet accustomed to it being there.

Pros:

Quick & easy setup, nice design, decent sound quality.

Cons:

No multiple profiles, no voice recognition, often fails to understand commands.