{"id":367486,"date":"2025-11-09T19:07:18","date_gmt":"2025-11-09T19:07:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/367486\/"},"modified":"2025-11-09T19:07:18","modified_gmt":"2025-11-09T19:07:18","slug":"gemini-in-google-home-is-incredibly-smart-until-it-isnt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/367486\/","title":{"rendered":"Gemini in Google Home is incredibly smart, until it isn’t"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\"\"<\/p>\n

Gemini for Google Home has arrived and, with it, a glimpse of Google\u2019s view of the future of the smart home. But that future is still held back by the simple fact that, like anything with AI, it makes too many mistakes.<\/p>\n

This issue of 9to5Google Weekender is a part of 9to5Google\u2019s rebooted newsletter that highlights the biggest Google stories with added commentary and other tidbits. Sign up here<\/a> to get it delivered to your inbox early!<\/p>\n

Over the past couple of weeks I\u2019ve had Gemini for Home active with my Google Nest devices and my feelings are pretty split. On the one hand, Gemini adds a lot of impressive new functionality to the experience.<\/p>\n

Starting with \u201cAsk Home,\u201d the ability to just search for a thing that happened instead of combing through footage is awesome. Being able to know my camera was watching and ask \u201cwhere is my laptop\u201d only to get a response is just\u2026 well, it\u2019s the future, isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n

\tAdvertisement – scroll for more content<\/p>\n

Of course, search is just one piece of that puzzle, and it\u2019s built in part on Gemini\u2019s ability to see a Nest Cam feed and intelligently label the event with what it saw. Again, super useful! Frankly, it\u2019s a little crazy this isn\u2019t how the smart home has always worked. Truly, it\u2019s just invaluable, because previously, your only indication regarding what the camera saw was basically \u201chere\u2019s this person\u201d or \u201chey look, a dog\u201d or \u201cwell, something definitely moved,\u201d meaning the task of figuring out when an event happened fell on you. Looking back, generic notifications just weren\u2019t enough. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nThe three pillars of Gemini for Home are truly brilliant ideas<\/p>\n

This also leads to the third big piece of Gemini for Home, which is \u201cHome Brief,\u201d a daily summary of your Nest Cam recordings.The idea here is to give you a quick overview of what happened over the course of the day, rather than just relying on you constantly watching your notification feed. Neat!<\/p>\n

But, it doesn\u2019t always work.<\/p>\n

Each of these three pillars of the new Gemini-enhanced Google Home experience has its own set of issues, and they take away from what is otherwise an incredibly smart way to treat the smart home. <\/p>\n

Starting with notification labels, this succumbs to the same trap that every AI product faces \u2013 absurd overconfidence.<\/p>\n

Gemini\u2019s summaries of what happened in a given piece of Nest footage are sometimes accurate, but sometimes make Google Home look like a fool. For every \u201cBen is in the kitchen cooking chicken\u201d \u2013 yes, it managed to correctly recognize chicken \u2013 there\u2019s a \u201cBen loads a bicycle into the car\u201d when, in fact, I did not. It\u2019s usually minor stuff like this. Mislabeling an object that\u2019s not quite sure what to do with. For instance, the \u201cbicycle\u201d I took out of the car was actually a disc golf cart (which looks nothing like a bike), and I didn\u2019t actually take it out of the car in the clip that was labeled. There was another instance where my wife took the trash outside, but Gemini labeled that as her placing a package on the porch. For some reason, Gemini also can\u2019t decide if my car is blue, which it is, or gray, which it is not even close to. I\u2019ll certainly give it credit for accurately being able to tell the right make and model of both of our cars, though. Similarly, it also sometimes identifies the same event in different ways. While using a leaf blower in the backyard, Gemini changed its mind halfway through and said I was using a rake instead.<\/p>\n

The mistakes are usually minor stuff, but enough to make you do a double-take. That said, there are examples out there of\u2026 worse failures. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nFor every time Gemini gets something right, it also tends to make a weird mistake that makes you do a double-take<\/p>\n

The Verge noted<\/a> earlier this week that Gemini was unable to recognize the homeowner walking by their camera with a shotgun, instead calling it a \u201cgarden tool,\u201d and also wouldn\u2019t label a knife in the summary. I\u2019ve also noticed that Gemini tends to be pretty non-descript around objects it\u2019s not sure about, but with these being security cameras, knives and guns are pretty high on the list of objects I want it to be able to properly identify!<\/p>\n

These same issues bleed over to \u201cHome Brief.\u201d The summaries are a useful way to get a quick overview, but they are too confident about what they\u2019re trying to say. I also feel like this feature is too eager to make a long list. \u201cBen sat on the couch\u201d really provides no value in one of these summaries in my book. \u201cAsk Home\u201d only has one headache so far, at least to me, which is that it\u2019s kind of slow. Again, the feature is generally way faster than scouring through the footage yourself, but it\u2019s just slow enough to respond to your query that it can be frustrating. I definitely don\u2019t need it to be instant, but waiting 15-25 seconds while it \u201cthinks\u201d feels like a bit of wasted time.<\/p>\n

So, what\u2019s next?<\/p>\n

Well, Google Home\u2019s Gemini features are, for now, all in beta anyway. This is the \u201cEarly Access\u201d period where things are not reflective of the final product and, with that in mind, we\u2019re seeing a rather good foundation. There\u2019s a lot of room for improvement, definitely, but also a lot of great ideas already at play. <\/p>\n

That said, I\u2019m not sure we\u2019ll ever fully be rid of this missteps, at least in this current step for AI. The biggest problem with Gemini for Home is also the reason why these features are possible in the first place. AI is powerful, but it\u2019s still overconfident and prone to mistakes that, well, look stupid! That\u2019s why I\u2019m glad Google\u2019s setup here is opt-in, as you won\u2019t get most of these features without explicitly signing up for them. <\/p>\n

What do you think? Have you been using Gemini for Home? <\/p>\n

This Week\u2019s Top Stories<\/p>\n

The YouTube TV-Disney battle continues<\/strong><\/p>\n

After channels went dark late last week, the battle between YouTube TV and Disney has only continued to push on. Neither side seems ready to give in, and everything looks very hostile. Meanwhile, YouTube TV subscribers seem ready to cancel, while Disney is seeing a drop in viewer numbers.<\/p>\n

Gemini expands to the car<\/strong><\/p>\n

Google announced this week that Google Maps would pick up new Gemini features and, right alongside that, Android Auto has started its Gemini rollout, replacing Google Assistant.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

More Top Stories<\/p>\n

From the rest of 9to5<\/p>\n

9to5Mac:<\/strong> Rumor Replay: iPhone 18 Pro colors, iOS 27, iPhone Air 2, more<\/a><\/p>\n

9to5Toys:<\/strong> Official Walmart early Black Friday deals and prices leak online in new sneak peek ad<\/a><\/p>\n

Electrek:<\/strong> Tesla updates its electric semi truck design<\/a><\/p>\n

Follow Ben:<\/strong>\u00a0Twitter\/X<\/a>,\u00a0Threads<\/a>, Bluesky<\/a>, and\u00a0Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\"Add
\n\t\t\t\"Add
\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\t\t\t\t