This article aims to address the importance of Reply (Google) in today's society. Reply (Google) has been a topic of relevance for years and its impact has become much more evident in recent times. Since its inception, Reply (Google) has played a fundamental role in various aspects of daily life, influencing both on a personal and collective level. On this occasion, the impact of Reply (Google) in different areas will be analyzed in depth, as well as its relevance today. In addition, it seeks to provide a broad and critical perspective on the role that Reply (Google) plays in our society, highlighting its influence on culture, politics, economy and technological development.
Reply was an app by Area 120, Google's experimental workshop, released to closed beta testing in February 2018, and shortly after reported as leaked. The app allowed users to insert pre-defined replies called "Smart Replies" into conversations on messaging apps on their phone such as Facebook Messenger, Slack and Google Hangouts. The beta testing was cancelled in October, 2018.
Reply suggested various responses to questions or statements based on statements by the user's conversation partner. The suggested replies varied according to the type of incoming message (detected by the tone, contents of the message, and the user's context, which may trigger "Vacation responder" or "Urgent" types of automatic replies). Additionally, based on the phone accelerometer, Reply was able to determine whether the user was in a vehicle or biking and could auto-respond appropriately. It could also reply appropriately when the user was sleeping. The user can see the suggested responses in their notifications and decide if they want to send one of them from the notification without having to open the app in which the response is sent.