Google Home starts battle with Amazon for living rooms

Talking to computers was once for the likes of Captain Kirk, but a new product due to be announced by Google on Tuesday demonstrates that it believes devices that can speak to humans are ready for the living room. The search engine giant is expected to launch its Google Home "personal assistant" speaker system – a squat cylinder that will be able to process search requests and other everyday tasks when instructed to by the sound of a human voice. For many, conversations with computers consist of frustrating attempts to provide credit card numbers to a bank or talking to a bemused mobile phone, but Amazon has transformed the market, with the help of Alexa, its digital assistant, which lives inside its multimillion-selling Echo. A week ago Amazon said it would start selling the Echo in the UK at 149.99, two years after its introduction in the US, where it had become a sleeper hit. Despite a low-key launch the Echo sold 3.5m units in the time it took Amazon to adapt the device to recognise the full gamut of British English accents and voices.