Some waves were generated at the 2013 Google I/O conference this May, when a key speaker took centre stage to make a bold announcement: Google was currently planning out steps which would, if carried out successfully, eventually lead to ‘the end of search’;
The speaker was none other than Amit Singhal, a senior vice president and engineer at Google: a prominent figure in search, whose very presence made developers and journalists alike stand up and take note;
Its search Jim, but not as we know it
It turns out that, in the series of presentations which took place during the conference, Mr Singhal was not so much spelling out some sort of master-plan to scrap search, but was instead alluding to the fact that Google is working on advancements which will make the search of the future a more ‘Star Trek-like’ experience.
What does Google mean by a ‘Star Trek-like’ search?
In the various iterations of the extremely popular science-fiction TV show, ‘Star Trek’, computer systems are depicted as being ever-present assistants to the crew of the ‘Star Ship Enterprise’;
Rather than sitting at a keyboard and typing in a search query, the characters on the show simply prompt their systems into action by saying the word: ‘Computer’…followed up by a question, such as: ‘are there Klingons on the starboard bow?’, which prompts the computer to answer the question directly, with a range of relevant data being pulled up nearly instantaneously.
In such a scenario, the computer becomes a digital assistant, an intelligent helper that leads the user through the world around them, providing information that is not just relevant to a specific search query, but to their needs as a human being at that point in time.
How would such a system potentially work in reality?
- You’d ask your system a question in a natural manner, for example, by speaking to it.
- The system would fully understand your question, without the need for any further prompts.
- You’d then receive a completely relevant answer to your question, that would take into account the context in which it was asked and how the answer would relate to you as an individual.
If Google’s vision is realised, a future search engine will be:
- A more conversational, natural and personalised system.
- Capable of harnessing the full power of all available digitised human knowledge.
- Universally accessible.
- Aware of its user and their individual needs.
This is all very well, but is Google any closer to achieving such results?
Some food for thought:
- Google is currently aware of over 30 trillion unique URLS online.
- Each month, Google has to deal with 100 billion searches.
- 20 billion pages are crawled every single day by Googlebot.
And whilst you digest those figures, consider these services and features that Google has developed or is currently working on:
- ‘Google Now’: A personal assistant which uses a natural user interface to answer questions.
- ‘Google Voice Search’: A powerful search tool which supports a huge range of languages.
- The increasing presence of a consistent user experience across platforms, via the Chrome browser and other technologies which are fast becoming ubiquitous.
- The ability for search to access a signed-in user’s information intelligently, for example: to search emails, flight bookings, calendar events, current location and more.
- A recent proof-of-concept demonstration in which the presenter initiated a Google search, simply by announcing: ‘OK Google,’ followed by a question or an order.
With such a vast amount of information available at its beck and call, as well as the mind-boggling array of new technologies that the company is developing and refining, it is looking increasingly likely that Google may achieve their goal of taking its users where no search has been before.
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