Your News Update Comes to Google Assistant

Google today announced a feature called “Your News Update” for its Assistant-powered smart speakers and smartphones.

“Your News Update, a smarter way to listen to the news hosted by the Google Assistant,” Google’s Liz Gannes writes. “You can try it today by updating your Assistant news settings.”

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Your News Update is an evolution of Google’s previous work with news, including its original 2016 Assistant-based news offering and a feature, added in 2018, that lets users ask specific questions about the news.

Basically, the Your News Update starts playing whenever you say “Hey Google, play me the news” on any Assistant-enabled phone or smart speaker. Google says that it consists of a mix of short news stories chosen on the fly and based on your interests, location, user history and preferences, as well as the top news stories of the day. The experience will change as you keep listening to include longer-form content.

Your News Update is available in English in the United States only, but it will expand internationally next year, Google says.

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  • IanYates82

    Premium Member
    20 November, 2019 - 7:07 am

    <p>The "give me the news" feature works fairly well here in Australia. </p><p><br></p><p>However the sources it draws upon vary in quality. When it plays from our ABC (like PBS for the US) it's great – high quality, actual people reading it, etc. Then you get the Daily Telegraph's news… The quality of the content is already quite low (unabashed right wing campaigning paper) but it also sounds like they've had the low-paid intern literally phone in the news as a recording. Then you get Courier Mail (another paper from the Murdoch stable) where, at least the times I've got that far, it's been a robot voice doing the reading…</p><p><br></p><p>I've customised it a bit more now to avoid most of the above and it's not bad. However with a few new 7am-style podcasts starting here in Australia in recent months, and getting First Ring Daily showing up about 4am local time, I don't need Google's "give me the news" feature all that much anymore anyway.</p>

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