Microsoft’s digital assistant, Cortana, fell behind Google Assistant and Alexa in 2018. The software giant has been slowly repositioning Cortana as a skill that can run anywhere, rather than a rival to Google, Amazon, or Apple’s assistants. Microsoft now appears to be targeting Cortana at more conversational interactions for workers who are organizing their days. At Microsoft’s Build developer conference this year, the company is showing examples of how Cortana will be able to respond to conversations and organize meetings and reminders proactively.
That future, in which people effortlessly ask for something from their always-everywhere computer and can ask further requests based on the response, isn’t several centuries away. Apparently, it’s possible today.
During its Build developer conference in Seattle on Monday, Microsoft showed off new technology for its Cortana voice assistant. The upgrades, powered in part by technology Microsoft acquired for an undisclosed amount last year through a company called Semantic Machines, allows someone to have an ongoing conversation tracking scheduling appointments, reminders and other similar tasks with little effort.
For example, today we can typically ask voice assistants to read back our calendars, but Microsoft believes that in the not too distant future, we won’t need to bark out “Siri!” or “Cortana!” Instead, we’ll merely ask our always-listening assistants what our schedules are, whether the right people have been invited to meetings and where we have lunch plans set. And Microsoft says we won’t need to use the stilted language most voice assistants require these days.
While it’s only a demo, Microsoft’s talk about the future of voice assistants offers a promising look at where this technology is headed. Today, we’ve had to learn a mishmash of odd phrasing and repeated commands to get voice-controlled technology to do what we want it to. And often, they get it wrong anyway, particularly when we dictate a message to them.
That’s part of why Microsoft is touting its advances. While the company’s Cortana voice assistant is included in its Windows 10 software for PCs and can be downloaded for Apple iPhones and Android-powered devices, it isn’t as widely used as Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant or Amazon’s Alexa, according to data from industry researcher Voicebot.ai.
The company’s also been bulking up its technology for computers to understand what we say, creating new features for its Skype team chat system.
What’s unclear is when Microsoft will be able to offer this conversational AI tech to the rest of us. For now, it’s just a demonstration.
