Google is completely revamping its news product to make it more robust, featuring YouTube videos and tweets, and well as traditional articles.

In the app’s new iteration, Google tries to balance artificial intelligence-fueled personalization with features that encourage people not to get stuck in “filter bubbles” that reinforce their preconceived opinions or ideas.

“We are Using AI to bring forward the best of what journalism has to offer. We want to give users quality sources they trust but build a product that works for publishers,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai said in a keynote speech at the company’s annual I/O developer conference. “Overall we want to make sure we are giving them deeper insight and a fuller perspective of the topics they are interested in.

When users first opens the app, they’ll see five main news stories. As users continue scrolling, they will begin to see news stories personalized to their interests, Trystan Upstill, head of the Google news product, said at the event. Users will also be able to train the company’s AI to feature their preferred publishers.

However, there will also be two features, “Full Coverage” and “Headlines,” which give a more unfiltered way to access news. One of the recent criticisms of Search and YouTube have been that they can push people into filter bubbles, by serving them the kind of content or viewpoints that they’ve already shown interest in.

Full Coverage gives a complete picture of the story from a variety of sources, in a variety of different points of view, and it will be the same no matter who is looking at it.

“Having a productive conversation or debate requires everyone to have access to the same information,” Upstill said.

The Headlines feature will also show what people are reading all around the world. “

Pichai spoke and Upstill spoke at the company’s annual I/O developer conference. Watch the live stream of Pichai’s keynote here.

The three-day I/O event is typically an opportunity for Google to show off its artificial intelligence tools and announce upcoming products, like the latest version of its Android operating system.

This year the conference comes amid broader policy discussions, as Google prepares to roll out privacy changes in compliance with stricter GDPR standards out of Europe.

— CNBC’s Chloe Aiello contributed to this report.

Source: Tech CNBC
Google is completely revamping its News product to give readers 'deeper insight' into the news