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> Roku alleges Google has asked it to favor YouTube music results from voice commands made on the Roku remote while the YouTube app is open, even if the user's

> Roku alleges Google has asked it to favor YouTube music results from voice commands made on the Roku remote while the YouTube app is open, even if the user's music preference is set to default to another music app, like Pandora. That's the behavior I would expect from a full screen app. ie, if I issue a command in a full screen app for the command to be interpreted in the context of that app.

gsich 6y ago
Make it configurable and everyone is happy.
- resizeitplz 6y ago
  It is configurable. Google is asking Roku to override the user's chosen configuration.
  - pythonaut_16 6y ago
    He's clearly suggesting making context aware search an option. "When searching within an app, favor results from that app" vs "When searching within an app always favor my default"
    - Nadya 6y ago
      >"When searching within an app, favor results from that app" vs >"When searching within an app, favor results from a related app" There is a big difference between these two things. "Youtube" is not the same as "Youtube Music" in the same way that "Xbox" is not the same as "Xbox Live". As p49k explained it - if you were trying to send an email from YouTube would you expect Gmail to come up or your preferred email app? What if Gmail was renamed to "Youtube Mail"? Would that change your expected behavior?
      - pythonaut_16 6y ago
        Sending an email is a different interaction than doing voice search. Sending an email is an explicit intent - open whatever app I use to send emails. Searching is an open query - find the most relevant results. What results are most relevant is subjective, hence why you would give the user a choice for what results to favor. The separation between Youtube and Youtube Music is a technical minutia, they're both Youtube just different apps. If you want a technical solution, Roku should probably implement a search API such that doing a voice search would let the Roku query whatever app is currently running for results. Then any app can provide more relevant, context aware results.
        Nadya 6y ago
        >Sending an email is a different interaction than doing voice search. Going from watching videos to playing music is a different interaction than doing voice search. >Sending an email is an explicit intent - open whatever app I use to send emails. Using a global voice commands (not search) has explicit behavior - use whatever app I have set to default for the functionality I am requesting. "Play Stairway to Heaven" should use my default music app. Note that "voice commands" is different from "voice search" in this context and is the alleged problem. >Searching is an open query - find the most relevant results. If I use Spotify as my default music app it is because I trust their music search more than YouTube Music. Otherwise YouTube Music would be my default music app. There is also a massive contextual difference between a global Voice Search (using the Voice search icon on the Roku remote: it searches Roku) and using the Speech to Text option that may appear when already searching within a search field (which uses the search field of the app itself, in this case: Youtube) >The separation between Youtube and Youtube Music is a technical minutia, they're both Youtube just different apps. Google deciding there is a difference between the two means that there is a difference between the two for both a marketing perspective and whatever minor technical differences there are. If there were no differences there would not be a YouTube Music app and to pretend otherwise is disingenuous.
        pythonaut_16 6y ago
        You're basically making the argument for why this should be a user preference. Do I want the current app I'm using to influence the result of a voice command or not. Unfortunately the line between voice commands and voice search is often fuzzy. Lines like this: > Roku alleges Google has asked it to favor YouTube music results from voice commands made on the Roku remote while the YouTube app is open make it unclear if it's talking about a search or a command. Ideally Roku would implement a more fine grained API where a user can set permissions/preferences on an app by app basis, similar to Android and iOS permissions APIs and especially how notifications are handled. Either way if Roku's allegations definitely don't paint Google in a good light here. It just seems like there could be more to this story.
stefan_ 6y ago
Maybe, maybe not? If I'm in Google Maps, should Siri offer me Google^TM-themed recommendations?
- ceejayoz 6y ago
  If I'm actively using Google Maps, I'd love for Siri to respond to "get directions to McDonalds" within the Google Maps context instead of opening Apple's.
  - p49k 6y ago
    Sure, but that’s not what Google is asking of Roku.
    - 908B64B197 6y ago
      It is. If their app is open and full screen, search within the app first.
      - p49k 6y ago
        No it isn’t. If you have Google maps open and suddenly decide you want to go to McDonald’s, then sure, that voice command should go to Google Maps. But if you make a voice command to send an email to someone, it shouldn’t open Gmail instead of your default mail app just because Google maps is open. Similarly, if you’re watching a video on YouTube and want to search for a cat video, sure, the voice command should search in YouTube. But if you want to listen to music and have Spotify set as your default music app, it shouldn’t send the request to YouTube Music just because YouTube is open.
        DashAnimal 6y ago
        But YouTube is a music streaming platform. The most popular, in fact (no, not YouTube music). I constantly listen to music across both Spotify and YouTube. YouTube serves video and doesn't present music in the way we usually think of it, albums sorted by artist, chronologically presented... But that isn't really how the younger gen listens to music. It is a music app and a common way a lot of people consume their music.
djanogo 6y ago
That's not at all how voice assists are meant to work. Voice icon in cars/remotes are all meant to provide answers or take commands irrespective of what's happening on that device or other devices they control.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  In a car sure. On a living room TV?
  - djanogo 6y ago
    iPhone siri (iphoone gesture), Fire stick microphone icons perform broad range of tasks irrespective of last task.
- vineyardmike 6y ago
  I don’t think you can make such a blanket statement. I think this behavior is what I would expect (search within open app first) and when it’s not present, it’s frustrating.
- mupuff1234 6y ago
  Quite the opposite, context is a critical aspect voice assistants currently lack.
pbhjpbhj 6y ago
I find FireTV stick (from Amazon) to be applying in this respect, it doesn't appear to know command that direct them input to a specific app. When I have Google open and ask it to search for $search-string it will do it in the Amazon store context, ie offer to sell me a program rather than find the string on Google. Annoying. It relates to the lack of discoverability in voice interfaces, there may be an incantation to get the behaviouyr I want but there's no way within the interface that such methods is revealed.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  s/applying/annoying
egberts1 6y ago
yeah, what’s worse about the YouTube crippling of its full-screen is that it actually DISABLED any captioning. Talk about corporate-imposed audism.

gsich 6y ago

Make it configurable and everyone is happy.

resizeitplz 6y ago
It is configurable. Google is asking Roku to override the user's chosen configuration.
- pythonaut_16 6y ago
  He's clearly suggesting making context aware search an option. "When searching within an app, favor results from that app" vs "When searching within an app always favor my default"
  - Nadya 6y ago
    >"When searching within an app, favor results from that app" vs >"When searching within an app, favor results from a related app" There is a big difference between these two things. "Youtube" is not the same as "Youtube Music" in the same way that "Xbox" is not the same as "Xbox Live". As p49k explained it - if you were trying to send an email from YouTube would you expect Gmail to come up or your preferred email app? What if Gmail was renamed to "Youtube Mail"? Would that change your expected behavior?
    - pythonaut_16 6y ago
      Sending an email is a different interaction than doing voice search. Sending an email is an explicit intent - open whatever app I use to send emails. Searching is an open query - find the most relevant results. What results are most relevant is subjective, hence why you would give the user a choice for what results to favor. The separation between Youtube and Youtube Music is a technical minutia, they're both Youtube just different apps. If you want a technical solution, Roku should probably implement a search API such that doing a voice search would let the Roku query whatever app is currently running for results. Then any app can provide more relevant, context aware results.
      - Nadya 6y ago
        >Sending an email is a different interaction than doing voice search. Going from watching videos to playing music is a different interaction than doing voice search. >Sending an email is an explicit intent - open whatever app I use to send emails. Using a global voice commands (not search) has explicit behavior - use whatever app I have set to default for the functionality I am requesting. "Play Stairway to Heaven" should use my default music app. Note that "voice commands" is different from "voice search" in this context and is the alleged problem. >Searching is an open query - find the most relevant results. If I use Spotify as my default music app it is because I trust their music search more than YouTube Music. Otherwise YouTube Music would be my default music app. There is also a massive contextual difference between a global Voice Search (using the Voice search icon on the Roku remote: it searches Roku) and using the Speech to Text option that may appear when already searching within a search field (which uses the search field of the app itself, in this case: Youtube) >The separation between Youtube and Youtube Music is a technical minutia, they're both Youtube just different apps. Google deciding there is a difference between the two means that there is a difference between the two for both a marketing perspective and whatever minor technical differences there are. If there were no differences there would not be a YouTube Music app and to pretend otherwise is disingenuous.
        pythonaut_16 6y ago
        You're basically making the argument for why this should be a user preference. Do I want the current app I'm using to influence the result of a voice command or not. Unfortunately the line between voice commands and voice search is often fuzzy. Lines like this: > Roku alleges Google has asked it to favor YouTube music results from voice commands made on the Roku remote while the YouTube app is open make it unclear if it's talking about a search or a command. Ideally Roku would implement a more fine grained API where a user can set permissions/preferences on an app by app basis, similar to Android and iOS permissions APIs and especially how notifications are handled. Either way if Roku's allegations definitely don't paint Google in a good light here. It just seems like there could be more to this story.

stefan_ 6y ago

Maybe, maybe not? If I'm in Google Maps, should Siri offer me Google^TM-themed recommendations?

ceejayoz 6y ago
If I'm actively using Google Maps, I'd love for Siri to respond to "get directions to McDonalds" within the Google Maps context instead of opening Apple's.
- p49k 6y ago
  Sure, but that’s not what Google is asking of Roku.
  - 908B64B197 6y ago
    It is. If their app is open and full screen, search within the app first.
    - p49k 6y ago
      No it isn’t. If you have Google maps open and suddenly decide you want to go to McDonald’s, then sure, that voice command should go to Google Maps. But if you make a voice command to send an email to someone, it shouldn’t open Gmail instead of your default mail app just because Google maps is open. Similarly, if you’re watching a video on YouTube and want to search for a cat video, sure, the voice command should search in YouTube. But if you want to listen to music and have Spotify set as your default music app, it shouldn’t send the request to YouTube Music just because YouTube is open.
      - DashAnimal 6y ago
        But YouTube is a music streaming platform. The most popular, in fact (no, not YouTube music). I constantly listen to music across both Spotify and YouTube. YouTube serves video and doesn't present music in the way we usually think of it, albums sorted by artist, chronologically presented... But that isn't really how the younger gen listens to music. It is a music app and a common way a lot of people consume their music.

djanogo 6y ago

That's not at all how voice assists are meant to work. Voice icon in cars/remotes are all meant to provide answers or take commands irrespective of what's happening on that device or other devices they control.

908B64B197 6y ago
In a car sure. On a living room TV?
- djanogo 6y ago
  iPhone siri (iphoone gesture), Fire stick microphone icons perform broad range of tasks irrespective of last task.
vineyardmike 6y ago
I don’t think you can make such a blanket statement. I think this behavior is what I would expect (search within open app first) and when it’s not present, it’s frustrating.
mupuff1234 6y ago
Quite the opposite, context is a critical aspect voice assistants currently lack.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago

I find FireTV stick (from Amazon) to be applying in this respect, it doesn't appear to know command that direct them input to a specific app. When I have Google open and ask it to search for $search-string it will do it in the Amazon store context, ie offer to sell me a program rather than find the string on Google. Annoying. It relates to the lack of discoverability in voice interfaces, there may be an incantation to get the behaviouyr I want but there's no way within the interface that such methods is revealed.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago
s/applying/annoying

egberts1 6y ago

yeah, what’s worse about the YouTube crippling of its full-screen is that it actually DISABLED any captioning. Talk about corporate-imposed audism.