N V Vijayakumar, Bengaluru, DH News Service, Sep 8 2017, 13:58 IST
Interacting with media from Google headquarters in Mountainview, California, Google Inc Search Vice President (Engineering) Shashi Thakur said the update will help users better tune the flow of news and information from the web to phone, enabling you to dig deeper on topics they are passionate about. Picture courtesy Twitter
Google on Friday announced the launch of the new feed in the Google app for Android and iOS for Indian users so that search experience can be made more personalised.
Interacting with media from Google headquarters in Mountainview, California, Google Inc Search Vice President (Engineering) Shashi Thakur said the update will help users better tune the flow of news and information from the web to phone, enabling you to dig deeper on topics they are passionate about.
“This is a natural evolution of search from a simple query. You can access the new feed by updating and launching the Google app on your phone. The feed will enable you to see cards containing the very latest sports highlights, top news, engaging videos, new music, stories about your hobbies and more, and will be available in English and Hindi,” he said.
The new feed will now enable users to follow topics right from search results, helping them to keep up with exactly what they care about and now onwards there will be a new “Follow” button on the knowledge panel.
Commenting on the development, Thakur said the system will learn algorithmically from users' past search queries and those which are trending the world over. “It is further enhancement of Google Now experience for users. From movies, sports favourite bands or music artists, famous people, and more, a quick tap on this button will allow you to start receiving updates and stories from the selected topic,” he said.
To make search more customised, users can unfollow a topic or interest they already selected by simply tapping a given card in your feed and unfollow, or visit your Google app settings to remove it from your feed.
Thakur also said that Google has made it easier than ever to give more additional information on their search queries which are relevant to inform, inspire and entertain. “Here we can provide a cluster of information on one topic to our users. Besides giving information from diverse perspectives and multiple viewpoints, it helps our users to build a 360-degree view point of a breaking story,” he said.
Giving a real life example, Thakur said if a google user is travelling to a particular place the search will help him to add info on the place also. “We give local content which will help the users while travelling. As regards to regional contents, we are updating lots of happening across the globe so that users get connected. We have made sure that Indian users will get more info on Mumbai flood than the Hurricane Irma in the United States,” he said.
Commenting on the technologies into the new initiative, he said Google has made search more comprehensive by bringing on board a repository of information on search queries. “Having an understanding of real world things, we try to give our users more information on their queries like movies, authors, actors etc.,” he said.