Hindi second-most used 'Assistant' language globally, says Google

Google, which has been working on supporting Indic languages across its products like Search, Lens and others on its platform, said it will make Google Assistant available in Hindi on all Android TVs.

Hindi has emerged as the second-most used language globally on Google Assistant, the tech giant's artificial intelligence powered assistant, behind just English, according to the tech giant.

The company, which has been working on supporting Indic languages across its products like Search, Lens and others on its platform, said it will soon make Google Assistant available in Hindi on all Android TVs.

"Since introducing the Assistant in India nearly two years ago, we've introduced Hindi and 8 additional Indic languages...We're thrilled to share that Hindi has become the second most used Assistant language globally after English across many types of devices in India...coming soon, the Assistant will also be available in Hindi on all Android TVs," Google Vice President, Product Management, Manuel Bronstein said.

He added that Indians have been using "the power of voice" to do a variety of things like finding information to help with homework, getting train schedules, among others.

Interestingly, last year, Google had said its voice-based assistant had received about 4.5 lakh proposals for marriage in India.

While Google didn't share the number of people using Assistant (which competes with Apple's Siri and Amazon's Alexa), it said the product is available in over 30 languages across 80 countries.

Google said starting today, users can talk to Assistant in Hindi by simply saying "Hey Google, talk to me in Hindi" across all Android, Android Go and KaiOS devices. Previously, users needed to activate Hindi language support from the settings option.

Tech companies like Google and Amazon are betting on vernacular languages as reports suggest that 90 per cent of new internet users in India are native language speakers.

This makes it imperative for these tech companies to offer rich experience in local languages in India that is witnessing strong growth in internet usage as well as consumption of connected devices.

On Wednesday, Amazon had announced that users in India can now speak to its voice assistant Alexa in Hindi to carry out tasks like checking cricket scores, requesting songs and even asking how she's doing.

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Be careful! Amazon workers are listening to what you tell Alexa

Amazon employs people to around the world to help improve the Alexa to powering its line of echo speakers.

Tens of millions of people use smart speakers and their voice software to play games, find music or trawl for trivia. Millions more are reluctant to invite the devices and their powerful microphones into their homes out of concern that someone might be listening.

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Sometimes, someone is.

Amazon.com Inc. employs thousands of people around the world to help improve the Alexa digital assistant powering its line of Echo speakers. The team listens to voice recordings captured in Echo owners’ homes and offices. The recordings are transcribed, annotated and then fed back into the software as part of an effort to eliminate gaps in Alexa’s understanding of human speech and help it better respond to commands.

The Alexa voice review process, described by seven people who have worked on the program, highlights the often-overlooked human role in training software algorithms. In marketing materials Amazon says Alexa “lives in the cloud and is always getting smarter.” But like many software tools built to learn from experience, humans are doing some of the teaching.

The team comprises a mix of contractors and full-time Amazon employees who work in outposts from Boston to Costa Rica, India and Romania, according to the people, who signed nondisclosure agreements barring them from speaking publicly about the program. They work nine hours a day, with each reviewer parsing as many as 1,000 audio clips per shift, according to two workers based at Amazon’s Bucharest office, which takes up the top three floors of the Globalworth building in the Romanian capital’s up-and-coming Pipera district. The modern facility stands out amid the crumbling infrastructure and bears no exterior sign advertising Amazon’s presence.

The work is mostly mundane. One worker in Boston said he mined accumulated voice data for specific utterances such as “Taylor Swift” and annotated them to indicate the searcher meant the musical artist. Occasionally the listeners pick up things Echo owners likely would rather stay private: a woman singing badly off key in the shower, say, or a child screaming for help. The teams use internal chat rooms to share files when they need help parsing a muddled word—or come across an amusing recording.

Sometimes they hear recordings they find upsetting, or possibly criminal. Two of the workers said they picked up what they believe was a sexual assault. When something like that happens, they may share the experience in the internal chat room as a way of relieving stress. Amazon says it has procedures in place for workers to follow when they hear something distressing, but two Romania-based employees said that, after requesting guidance for such cases, they were told it wasn’t Amazon’s job to interfere.

Seeking a job? Amazon has 1,300 openings in India, highest in Asia-Pacific

Amazon's job openings in India are way ahead of those in China, Japan and Singapore.

The recently announced changes in regulations for e-commerce firms with foreign investment may have sent Amazon into a tizzy, but it certainly did not stop the e-commerce giant from stepping up its hiring efforts in the country.

With 1,300 job openings in India, Amazon has the highest number of listings for Asia-pacific region on its website, reported The Times of India.

This is way ahead than China (467 job openings), Japan (381) and Singapore (174). Barring the United States, only Germany has as many openings as India.

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Most of the hiring is expected to be in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai.

It is not yet clear whether the openings are only for Amazon.com or also for Amazon Prime video, its voice assistant Alexa and the firm's other horizons as well.

The government's move to tighten norms has hit Amazon and Flipkart the hardest as the new regulations bar online marketplaces with foreign investment to sell products of companies where they hold stakes as well as ban exclusive marketing arrangements.

Industry sources say Amazon could be employing more people in India to push its case in the ongoing policy discussion with the Centre.

Amazon had said it has "always operated in compliance with the laws of the land" and is evaluating the new guidelines "to engage as necessary with the government to gain clarity".

According to the current policy, 100 per cent foreign direct investment (FDI) is permitted in marketplace e-commerce activities. It is prohibited in an inventory-based model.

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