With its snappy, conversational AI, Google’s latest Gemini tool brings AI camera tech squarely back to the smartphone.
At its much-anticipated annual I/O event, Google this week announced some exciting functionality to its Gemini AI model, particularly its multi-modal capabilities, in a pre-recorded video demo.
Although it sounds a lot like the « Live » feature on Instagram or TikTok, Live for Gemini refers to the ability for you to « show » Gemini your view via your camera, and have a two-way conversation with the AI in real time. Think of it as video-calling with a friend who knows everything about everything.
This year has seen this kind of AI technology appear in a host of other devices like the Rabbit R1 and the Humane AI pin, two non-smartphone devices that came out this spring to a flurry of hopeful curiosity, but ultimately didn’t move the needle away from the supremacy of the smartphone.
Now that these devices have had their moments in the sun, Google’s Gemini AI has taken the stage with its snappy, conversational multi-modal AI and brought the focus squarely back to the smartphone.
Google teased this functionality the day before I/O in a tweet that showed off Gemini correctly identifying the stage at I/O, then giving additional context to the event and asking follow-up questions of the user.
