Speaker 1: Rich Demiro here, Rich On Tech here with Mark Spates,
Speaker 1: product manager for Google Next. Mark, thanks so much for
Speaker 1: being on the podcast.
Speaker 2: Oh Rich, happy to be here.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about your brand new product. You've
Speaker 1: got the Nest Audio smart speaker. This is a ninety
Speaker 1: nine dollars smart speaker that kind of replaces a speaker
Speaker 1: that came out many years ago, the original Google Home.
Speaker 1: So tell me about this new speaker. I've got one
Speaker 1: right here, and it has a whole new look and
Speaker 1: feel to it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Rich, I think the first visual that you saw
Speaker 2: is part of the advancements that we made. And so
Speaker 2: when we launched the original Google Home, I think what
Speaker 2: was really interesting where people were surprised by its sound
Speaker 2: and they actually appreciated that for the value in the
Speaker 2: sound that they got. And so when we thought about
Speaker 2: the next generation of it, Nest Audio, there are a
Speaker 2: few things that we want to prove. On one, the
Speaker 2: sound quality itself, and for us, what we wanted to
Speaker 2: make sure is that there's a theoristic that users felt
Speaker 2: when they had this sound with Nest Audio. It should
Speaker 2: be full balanced with the lows and the mids and
Speaker 2: the highs. It should be very clear as well, that
Speaker 2: the vocals really come through and there's no distortion and
Speaker 2: it's natural. Really, what the users should feel is what
Speaker 2: the artists created and what they wanted to come through.
Speaker 2: And there's a few ways that we achieved this rich
Speaker 2: One is the Nest Audio actually has a seventy five
Speaker 2: milimeter Wolfer and a nineteen milimeter Twitter and this is
Speaker 2: really important because that allows us to really get better
Speaker 2: base and allows us to even be awesome with the
Speaker 2: vocals at extremely high values. But I think the key part,
Speaker 2: and I think the natural, like how Google solves problems,
Speaker 2: was we went about the tuning in a very software
Speaker 2: driven way, a very data driven way. And I'll tell
Speaker 2: you what that means. First, the team actually creates it
Speaker 2: with nes Mini, our own proprietary tuning software, and what
Speaker 2: that allows us to do is we can simulate over
Speaker 2: two thousand and five hundred possible listening positions for the device.
Speaker 2: And why is that important. It's because people have very
Speaker 2: different homes. They put these devices everywhere, and we want
Speaker 2: to make sure that it sounds great no matter where
Speaker 2: you put it. And the features that really come out
Speaker 2: of this data driven approach are three things. One, it's
Speaker 2: called base extension. What we're able to do is extend
Speaker 2: the base even when the device is at lower values,
Speaker 2: and so if you're listening to it on valume two
Speaker 2: or three, you still don't lose that emotional feeling of
Speaker 2: the base coming through. The next one is ambient IQ.
Speaker 2: What that allows us to do is leverage the background noise.
Speaker 2: Let's say the faucet is running or the dryer is running.
Speaker 2: We can make sure that the assistant voice actually adjusts
Speaker 2: so that you can hear it no matter where the
Speaker 2: device is in the room. And last, and I actually
Speaker 2: thinks important for Nest Audio is media EQ. What we're
Speaker 2: able to do is actually a just the tuning of
Speaker 2: nests Audio to the music you're listening to, be it
Speaker 2: hip hop or jazz or classical or the podcast as well.
Speaker 2: And so what you're really seeing is is Google really
Speaker 2: starting to develop a really clear way that we believe
Speaker 2: things should sound, and then the technology behind it to
Speaker 2: actually achieve it.
Speaker 1: Now, because you have so many speakers in the lineup
Speaker 1: at this point, everything from the Mini to the Max
Speaker 1: to the different displays, and this of course new Nest Audio,
Speaker 1: there's almost a reason to have one in every room.
Speaker 1: And you can at these price points. So tell me
Speaker 1: about the idea of building a whole house system. You've
Speaker 1: got this stream transfer feature and also the stereo pair feature,
Speaker 1: so explain how those sort of work in the realm
Speaker 1: of a house.
Speaker 2: Oh, this is this is my favorite part. You know,
Speaker 2: if I think about the things that I've been using
Speaker 2: the most since we've all been working from home, these
Speaker 2: are the features. And so the thing about creating that
Speaker 2: whole home audio experience is that first we want to
Speaker 2: make sure all our devices work together. And they all
Speaker 2: are using Cast, which is awesome, and so it can
Speaker 2: work with your hub, your hub Max, I can even
Speaker 2: work with your Crome cast devices that are connected to
Speaker 2: your TV right, So it really gives a pretty broad
Speaker 2: range of things that work together. But the real outcome
Speaker 2: is fill your home with music. And first it's about grouping,
Speaker 2: and so you can set up a group and I
Speaker 2: do this all the time. I literally have a group
Speaker 2: called home and it's like Yo playing music on home.
Speaker 2: But then I think there are other features that are
Speaker 2: about the context of what you're doing in that day.
Speaker 2: And so let's just say it's a Saturday and you're
Speaker 2: cleaning a house. Something like stream transfer is perfect, right,
Speaker 2: because what you can do is you're cleaning up in
Speaker 2: the kitchen as I do, then I actually start to
Speaker 2: move to the bathroom and I can say, hey, move
Speaker 2: the move the music to the bathroom. And then you
Speaker 2: get down clean up the bathroom. You got to go,
Speaker 2: you know, finish up, clean up the living room, and
Speaker 2: say hey, move the music to the living room. And
Speaker 2: that allows the.
Speaker 1: Music to say you just say those that term to it.
Speaker 1: And you sort of have to know what your speakers
Speaker 1: are named. I'm assuming right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you only have one speaker in our room,
Speaker 2: you can you can just use the room. But it
Speaker 2: also works if you say, hey, GI, move the room,
Speaker 2: move the music to the living room speaker, which is
Speaker 2: the name of the speaker. And so uh, this this, this,
Speaker 2: this easiness of being able to just use it with
Speaker 2: your voice is awesome. And if you have a Hub
Speaker 2: Max or you have a hub, you can also just
Speaker 2: do it with with touch you can go to the interface.
Speaker 2: You actually can do the same thing using the interface
Speaker 2: on a Hub or a Hub Max. Uh. The next
Speaker 2: feature which we just recently introduced, which is multi room expansion.
Speaker 2: This is the thought that sometimes you want to create
Speaker 2: a group dynamically on the on the fly that you
Speaker 2: haven't created before. And so the core things for this is,
Speaker 2: like you know, all of us sometimes we get into it,
Speaker 2: we get into the point where we're working out and
Speaker 2: so like this is what I do. I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I want the sound to come through a little bit more,
Speaker 2: and so let me put it on my Nest hub
Speaker 2: in the kitchen, let me put it on the audio
Speaker 2: and the bedroom, and also let me put it on
Speaker 2: my stereo pair that's out in the living room, and automatically,
Speaker 2: in real time, I can create that group by just
Speaker 2: selecting those devices. And so that's really awesome. And then
Speaker 2: the last one that you mentioned, Rich is stereo pair.
Speaker 2: And what's cool about Nests Audio from the ground up,
Speaker 2: it was designed for stereo pair. You put two of
Speaker 2: these devices together, man, they look beautiful, and it's because
Speaker 2: we thought that people would actually set them up for
Speaker 2: stereo pairs. And what this allows you to do is
Speaker 2: give stereo sound out of both devices. And it's really cool.
Speaker 2: Especially when you were listening to a song that has
Speaker 2: like vary ways of how the audio comes in or
Speaker 2: the sound comes in, you can hear the device is
Speaker 2: actually working together to add this extra level of dynamic
Speaker 2: to the actual sound experience.
Speaker 1: So what are people doing on these smart speakers? I mean,
Speaker 1: music is clearly probably one of the top things, I
Speaker 1: mean questions whether what are some of the things that
Speaker 1: your research tells you that people are using these for.
Speaker 2: Well, you know what's cool is things like routines are
Speaker 2: becoming extremely important, right because now our routine is all
Speaker 2: in the same place, and you have to figure out
Speaker 2: how to either make those easier or break them up.
Speaker 2: And so I'll give you a good example what I do.
Speaker 2: I have a routine that starts every day around five
Speaker 2: point thirty and all it does is it cuts on
Speaker 2: a few lights and it starts playing music. Rich. It's
Speaker 2: a really simple thing to remind me to get up
Speaker 2: and stop working. Right. It's like cause you can easily
Speaker 2: keep rolling if you don't have something that breaks it up, right,
Speaker 2: And so that's one thing that we're seeing a lot.
Speaker 2: And also like for children, Hey, there's like, hey, this
Speaker 2: is the worktime routine. This is like, okay, this is
Speaker 2: your playtime routine. And so I think the Google Assistant
Speaker 2: and our smart speakers are being super help on the
Speaker 2: home around those areas.
Speaker 1: Tell me about launching a product during a pandemic. I mean,
Speaker 1: planning for this probably began before COVID. And so when
Speaker 1: you realize that you have to continue this through this,
Speaker 1: how do you do it?
Speaker 2: Well? You take a deep breath, right and then and
Speaker 2: then you get back to work. And I think what
Speaker 2: the team did was was very valid. Like So what
Speaker 2: it was amazing to me is I thought about, Hey,
Speaker 2: there's things that in the testing where we have like
Speaker 2: echo chambers, and we have lots of things where we
Speaker 2: tested fabric and all these labs were actually on campus.
Speaker 2: Rich people took trucks and rented trucks and actually got
Speaker 2: the equipment from the campus and they put it in
Speaker 2: places like their garage or their extra their extra room.
Speaker 2: And so I would say in a couple of weeks
Speaker 2: we were back up and running. When you think about
Speaker 2: things like tuning, I actually think because of work for
Speaker 2: home ness, audio sounds better. And the reason why is
Speaker 2: our engineers we're spending so much time with the devices
Speaker 2: at home and they've got to experience the sound and
Speaker 2: real spaces on a constant basis. And I actually think
Speaker 2: things like the tuning and things like making the assistant
Speaker 2: faster got way better because we were living with these
Speaker 2: devices on a day in and day out basis.
Speaker 1: All right, now we're talking smart speakers, and some of
Speaker 1: the feedback I get is privacy. People are worried about
Speaker 1: something or someone or Google listening to them, tell me
Speaker 1: about privacy, and as that front and center on this device.
Speaker 2: Privacy is core to the experience that we want to
Speaker 2: deliver it to users in. It stems from our privacy
Speaker 2: commitments that we made a few years ago around how
Speaker 2: our devices work and how they're going to expect users privacy.
Speaker 2: And similar to our other devices, Nets Audio has a
Speaker 2: mute switch on the back, so you can easily turn
Speaker 2: it off if you want, and you can easily turn
Speaker 2: it back on when you need to. And then we
Speaker 2: also have the assistant privacy features where you can tell
Speaker 2: the system to forget the things that you said, or
Speaker 2: you can also go to your my activity and you
Speaker 2: can delete those items as well, And so we have
Speaker 2: multiple ways to make sure that we're respecting users' privacy.
Speaker 2: It is a core fundamental value that we want to
Speaker 2: make sure that we deliver to users.
Speaker 1: All right, before we go, can you give me any
Speaker 1: tips or tricks, any commands to try that I haven't
Speaker 1: thought of.
Speaker 2: Oh. I think one of the coolest things is actually
Speaker 2: starting to use your phone as a way to start
Speaker 2: to interact with the device. So casting some of your
Speaker 2: favorite apps to the device I think is really cool.
Speaker 2: I think actually going to the Google Home app and
Speaker 2: starting to use the interface to control how you're moving
Speaker 2: your music is really awesome. The last thing that I
Speaker 2: will say from an assistance standpoint that it's kind of
Speaker 2: exciting to me is now we're just playing a little
Speaker 2: game of trivia at home where we use the assistant
Speaker 2: as kind of like the game show hosts. And it's
Speaker 2: pretty fun, right, And so we'll sit there and right
Speaker 2: now we're doing it because the NBA Finals have started,
Speaker 2: Like it's all about the status, and so we'll sit
Speaker 2: there and well, you know, have a fun time going
Speaker 2: back and forth about like, hey, what set player percentage
Speaker 2: for shooting? What set player? Hey what set player this
Speaker 2: and that, And it's a really cool, fun way to
Speaker 2: expand the way that you're interacting and change the way
Speaker 2: that you're interacting with the people in your home. But
Speaker 2: it's also using the smart speaker, and I think in
Speaker 2: a really unique.
Speaker 1: Way awesome mark Space, product manager for Google Nest. Thanks
Speaker 1: so much for joining me today. I do appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Talking about the new Google Nest Audio smart speaker. My
Speaker 1: name is rich dmiro Rich on tech dot TV. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening.