this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2024

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Google has replaced the Google Assistant app on Android with Gemini by default (www.androidauthority.com)

submitted 9 months ago by Squire1039@lemm.ee to c/technology@lemmy.world

136 comments fedilink hide all child comments

This means:

Downloading or updating the Assistant app now gives you Gemini instead.
You can switch back to Assistant in the Gemini app settings.
This might be Google's first step towards replacing Assistant completely with Gemini.
Some users are unaware of the switch and see two Gemini apps on their phones.

Overall, this may suggest Google is phasing out Assistant and transitioning users to the newer Gemini AI technology.

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[–] Aopen@discuss.tchncs.de 78 points 9 months ago (4 children)

Open developer options on the phone and turn ADB to ON.
Connect the PC to the phone with a cable.
Open terminal.
Run "adb uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.googleassistant".
Enjoy your private life.

[–] selokichtli@lemmy.ml 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

No Profit?

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[–] ryan213@lemmy.ca 75 points 9 months ago (23 children)

Do people use Assistant for more than just reminders, weather, and directions? Lol Just curious because that's all I use it for.

[–] charles@lemmy.world 69 points 9 months ago (8 children)

"set a timer for X minutes" And "set an alarm for X AM" are super helpful

[–] Kraven_the_Hunter@lemmy.dbzer0.com 27 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

I've tried one extra layer of complexity - "Remind me to water the plants when I get home" or something like that. It has no idea what I'm asking it to do despite knowing the "remind me" phrase and knowing where my home is.

[–] hitmyspot@aussie.zone 31 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It used to work years ago. It's not a technology problem. They changed their policy around location based reminders. One of the reasons I'm degoogling. I got rid of apple products too when they got rid of Google maps in favour of apple maps. Forcing a poorer product on users shows contempt for users.

[–] JackGreenEarth@lemm.ee 15 points 9 months ago (3 children)

But you can install any map app you like? There are plenty of legitimate reasons to not use an iPhone, but that's not one of them.

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 9 points 9 months ago

Can install, but can’t default them.

Also a slightly degraded experience compared to the OEM app.

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[–] uninvitedguest@lemmy.ca 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Add X to Y list is great for when you run out of something in the kitchen.

[–] Plopp@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

X is already on my Why? list.

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[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 25 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Simple timers, controlling the lights, background music, reminders, and occasionally thing like "how many tablespoons in a pint".

I don't ask it for the weather because I don't want a 30 second lecture on the weather, and it won't give me "cold now, hot later, might rain between".

Given that Gemini seem to be unable to give short answers, and it can't control stuff, it's missing most of what I require.

[–] NarrativeBear@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (3 children)

Odd I seem to be able to control all my IOT devices no problem so far from Gemini with voice commands over the phone. This includes all smart switches, lights, thermostats, and so on in my house

It seems to function a little quicker in response with the voice commands IMO.

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[–] original_reader@lemm.ee 14 points 9 months ago

You use the assistant?

[–] Horsey@kbin.social 6 points 9 months ago

I do a job where my hands are potentially full and I cannot touch my phone for extended periods of time. I use the assistant for as much as it will let me...

[–] tiredofsametab@kbin.run 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I've only ever activated it by accident (I think it's double-click the power button on my phone). Never actually used the thing.

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[–] 0x2d@lemmy.ml 43 points 9 months ago (3 children)

yay, more nonsense added to stock android (degoogle now)

[–] hornedfiend@sopuli.xyz 18 points 9 months ago (10 children)

After being on Graphene for the past 2 years,I decided to reinstall with no google at all,since my bank app now works without any google services dependencies.

hooray for me,I'm finally free and can profit from multiuser installed sandboxed services in another user profile if needed.

Glad to be out of this downward spiral.

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[–] xorollo@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I need a degoogle wiki to all me through all the things I can do to degoogle and what conveniences I might loose and potential workarounds for them. E.g. I spent a few hours getting rid of chrome, but then found out that if I want to use maps from my home screen, I can't use the search bar and I need another button on my homescreen. Also, apparently I use the images tab on Google often, and ddg doesn't have an images filter.

So anyway, without good replacements for my typical workflow, I end up just adding inconvenience and still falling back on the old workflows when I can't figure out how to get what I need degoogled.

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[–] soulfirethewolf@lemdro.id 6 points 9 months ago (3 children)

I can't wait for home assistant assist to be good enough to replace Gemini as a assistant. Without the need for an llm

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[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 34 points 9 months ago (5 children)

I knew they were going to end up going full gemini, but this seems too soon to pull such shenanigans, considering it's still slow to respond, can't do several things that assistantcan do, and is 100% useless when not on data.

[–] vox@sopuli.xyz 16 points 9 months ago

in fact it can only interact with your phone by generating google assistant commands and passing them on

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[–] then_three_more@lemmy.world 19 points 9 months ago

And it still won't be as useful as Google Now

[–] ArugulaZ@kbin.social 17 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Is this gonna be one of those tech bandwagon things that Google fails at so consistently? You know, like Google phones, Google Plus, Google Pay, Google Stadia, Google Your Poodle, etc.

[–] Tagger@lemmy.world 20 points 9 months ago

Google phones are some of the most popular in the marketplace (and their os is the most popular in the world) and Google pay works absolutely fine - I use it everyday, albeit with the new name of wallet.

[–] MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works 16 points 9 months ago (12 children)

Google pay and google phones are failures?

Both are THE standard for their respective industries, what you on about?

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[–] chokidar@lemmy.world 16 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Your device is not your device. Google's device, google's rules!

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[–] le_saucisson_masquay@sh.itjust.works 14 points 9 months ago (9 children)

Make yourself a favor, delete this crap and instead use a real open source (means apache2) AI that performs even better than chatgpt4 or Google ai. Get Mistral 7B.

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 19 points 9 months ago

Good recommendation.

Probably won’t hit quite GPT-4 levels of performance but still good.

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[–] Chozo@kbin.social 12 points 9 months ago (5 children)

It's default? When I downloaded it, I had to manually choose Gemini to be the default. It wasn't set like that for me.

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[–] solidgrue@lemmy.world 11 points 9 months ago

Haha, Google. I already type my dumb questions at DuckDuckGo

Srsly... Gemini is pretty cool tho. When I want an AI at least. (Rarely)

[–] alansuspect@aussie.zone 10 points 9 months ago (1 children)

What if I don't use Assistant? Does it still have access to other parts of my phone?

[–] Squire1039@lemm.ee 9 points 9 months ago

It looks like you can switch the assistant to the old one, and then turn that one off.

But just like Microsoft, Google is going to use this technology everywhere. If in the future (or now, if it is already available to you), you use features to describe images, summarize data, create texts, you probably will be using some form of Gemini.

[–] wheeldawg@sh.itjust.works 10 points 9 months ago (3 children)

I'm confused. There is no assistant app as far as I can tell. It seems to just be part of the OS.

I don't see a Gemini app either though.

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[–] SkaveRat@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 9 months ago (4 children)

it's not as if the default assistant was actually good. can't make it any worse, at least

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 6 points 9 months ago

And somehow they did. It can't interact with things like lights that the other one can.

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[–] krimson@feddit.nl 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The AI part runs in the cloud or on the phone?

[–] Evotech@lemmy.world 7 points 9 months ago (5 children)

Cloud. LLMs aren't there where they can be run on phones at conversational speed yet.

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