Mercedes-Benz vehicles get Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa support

Those in the US that have a 2016 or 2017 Mercedes-Benz are getting new functionalities for its car. Mercedes-Benz is bringing support for Google Assistant via Google Home speaker and Amazon Alexa via Amazon Echo line of speakers. As the video demo shows above, you can have these smart assistants do things such as start the car, turn off any appliances left on when you leave the house, and help with navigation. The feature also brings the ability to remotely lock the car.

Aside from having the smart speakers at home, you’ll need to have an active “Mercedes me” account as well as an active Mbrace subscription that costs around US$280 per year. According to the car maker, it plans to bring Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa support to Europe later this year.

Source: Android Authority

Google Home now has multi-user support for up to six accounts

It’s finally come, even if Google Home isn’t officially available here just yet. Google’s smart speaker/home assistant can support up to six accounts and it can tailor its answers to each person based on their voice. Google makes use of neural networks to identify who’s speaking to it. It picks up certain characteristics in your voice and compares it to previous analysis to see if you’re the one speaking to it. Google boasts this does “only on your device, in a matter of milliseconds.”

But Google has a disclaimer—which it puts in its YouTube ad—that someone who has a similar voice to you might be able to get answers from Home based on your profile. The feature has started to roll out to users in the US and is expected to come to the UK in the coming weeks. Now, here’s to hoping Google Home officially launches here, especially since it’s gotten a whole lot more useful.

Source: The Verge

Google Home could be getting multi-user support soon

One of the downsides of Google Home speaker is it’s tied to one account but that might change soon. A new card has been spotted in the Discover tab that hints at multi-user support coming to the home assistant and offering different users a more personalized experience with it. As Android Central reports, there doesn’t seem to be any functionality to it yet. But it does give us hope that Google Home will be getting a slew of new features and its coming soon.

First impressions on Google Home

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

One of my biggest frustrations is that it takes so much time for a lot of technology to make it from the US to Canada. Certain items like voice assistants, streaming boxes, and apps take longer to come to Canada and when they do make it here, their features are often hobbled compared to the US versions.

This is true with Amazon's Echo product, which was ubiquitous at this year's CES, and this is also true with Google Home. These voice assistant speakers and hubs are supposed to be the next big technology and they're not openly available in Canada.

I picked up a Google Home during a recent US trip knowing full well that the smart speaker might not be fully supported in Canada. Here are my impressions.

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