Google Smart Headphones Latest Rumors: 'Bisto' Audio Wearable to Function With Voice-Controlled Assistant?
Google is looking to take on Apple's Airpods with its own brand of smart audio wearables, if rumors are to be believed. The latest beta of the Google app refers to a curious device called "Bisto," which could be smart headphones that come with Google Assistant.
Researchers took Google's latest app, decompiled it, and sifted through the resulting jumble of code and text to look for clues as to what the Mountain View company has been up to recently.
This painstaking process called an "APK teardown" finally yielded something interesting as 9 to 5 Google found clues about a smart audio device called "Bisto" buried within version 7.10 of the Google app beta.
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One of these gems was a text string which may someday offer help to future "Bisto" owners. "Your headphones have the Google Assistant. Ask it questions. Tell it to do things. It's your own personal Google, always ready to help," the excerpt read, which could suggest that his device will carry Google's artificial intelligence helper sometime in the future.
Several clues hint that "Bisto" could refer to a pair of headphones, as some more help prompts look to be intended to help users interact with the device to raise or lower music volume or skip music tracks.
These features also look to be voice-activated while also requiring the use of a button on the headset, as another text tip suggests. "To talk to me or ask me a question, press and hold the Google Assistant button on the left earcup while talking," a string called "voice_query_wrong_button4″ explains.
While all these interpretations amount to little more than rumors and speculation, for now, it's likely that Google has already made some progress towards its development of smart headphones.
As Google looks to be omitting the headphone jack for their upcoming Pixel 2 phones, it's looking more and more likely that this "Bisto" smart earpieces are meant to go with the company's new flagship phones. This trend is consistent with how Apple offered their Airpods for the iPhone 7 with its lack of a headphone jack, as Tech Radar noted.
