Siri is an interesting concept, with additional time and money (of which Apple has both) it may one day become truly useful.
For now, however it's not much use, especially outside of the US.
In the UK Siri will not look up any map or business information, simple questions seem to throw it off. A mind numbing example hit me yesterday.
I was walking home, it was raining so I was holding my umbrella, I'd forgotten my watch at home and so asked Siri for the time. I said, "what is the time" Siri responded "I do not know what the time is on Newport Road". All the stupid thing had to do was look at the clock on my phone and read it to me. It will give me the time in bangkok or any city/country in the world but will not simply give you the time as displayed on your iPhone. In the end I asked it for the time in London as that's the time for the UK as a whole. Honestly now how ridiculous is that?
I've found many areas where Siri is unable to do the simplest thing, contacts that have only a forename for example really seem to non-plus Siri.
I look forward to the improvements that Apple will make with Siri, but for now it can't even perform half of the tasks that it's supposed to be able to do, especially outside of the US. Very dissapointing.
The thing that I find funny regarding some of the comments about not communicating with your phone is this... if I'm out and about in a public place, I'd likely be using my earbuds. You speak with Siri using common everyday language, so how does anyone around me know whether I'm talking to my digital personal assistant or a human assistant back at the office?
Personally, I have no issue with using a digital personal assistant, in public or in private. I think Siri is very useful right out of the gate and will only get more so.
Perhaps they don't see the value of Siri. Perhaps they criticize it simply because they cannot compete with it (yet) or because they are trying to move attention away from Apple and on to their devices.
We see this time and time again. Apple releases a product. Their competition publicly criticize it and in some cases openly mock it, only to then turn around and copy it in the coming months. Steve Ballmer's comments on the iPod, iPhone and iPad come to mind. He publicly slams everything that Apple does. I think that Ballmer does this not because he thinks that Apple's products are bad, he does it because he thinks that they're good.
I think that they really know that Siri is pretty amazing, especially for a beta, but really, Apple is their competition. You cannot expect them to publicly say how great it is and that they wish that they had it as well. They're never going to say that.
I think the novelty of Siri is already starting to wear off (which is WAY sooner than I expected). I myself was all over the blogs looking at Siri's responses to random questions. My friend I believe put it best, "It was the most entertaining 10 hours of my life. I'm wondering if I'll ever use it again though."
That is exactly as I would expect for the vast majority.
However, there may be a few people who continue to use it after the novelty wears off. I used to use the voice dial on my old Motorola phone because it worked well. When I got an iPhone, I gave up because Voice Command worked like shit.
I think the novelty of Siri is already starting to wear off (which is WAY sooner than I expected). I myself was all over the blogs looking at Siri's responses to random questions. My friend I believe put it best, "It was the most entertaining 10 hours of my life. I'm wondering if I'll ever use it again though."
Thank god such people are tired of Siri! Now that you are done burying all of your bodies and declaring your undying love and asking the meaning of life, maybe the rest of us who actually use it can have a better experience.
Just more proof how out of touch these guys are with reality and why the are better at copying than innovating. Having used Siri, I believe it's one of the most useful and powerful tools that's ever been available in a mobile device.
Let's see how long it takes Google and Microsoft to copy it.
I think it would have been more of a threat if Apple had waited until they got it out of beta. I've mainly head reviews and comments of it just not understanding people and the fact half the features don't work outside the US is a bit of a let down. Once people have used it and found it not to be 100% working yet, they just give up and will probably never try again.
It was a nice idea, ultimately best for sending messages while driving but I would agree it's not much of a threat. It will never become the standard way of using your phone, the same as people don't control there PC's via voice despite it also being perfectly possible. I also think the same for the next Xbox update, people will be able to control the whole Xbox dashbord via voice, but they will still use the controller.
Anyone who doesn't consider Siri a game changer just has no clue. I have had severe finger pain from typing for over 15 years. Yesterday I composed a tax letter using Siri and e-mailed it to my desktop. I then copy and pasted that email into a word document and finished up my tax letter. Additionally I composed this blog post using Siri. I don't think I would've ever posted before the iPhone 4S.
It will never become the standard way of using your phone...
That's funny. It's already the standard way I use my phone. Over 50% of my phone interaction is Siri. Additionally, it surfaces functionality that I would have never used without Siri. I don't believe I am alone in this.
Google Android boss Andy Rubin and Microsoft's Windows Phone head Andy Lees have both publicly criticized Apple's new Siri voice assistant and questioned its usefulness.
Based on the past performance of features these clowns panned, this means Siri is going to be the differentiator between the iPhone and the competitors going forward
Quote:
Rubin, who currently serves as Google's senior vice president of mobile, said in an interview on Wednesday that he doesn't "believe that your phone should be an assistant.”
“Your phone is a tool for communicating. You shouldn’t be communicating with the phone; you should be communicating with somebody on the other side of the phone,” he added.
Good grief, is he positioning himself for a position at Gartner in the future?!? Your phone shouldn't be an assistant? I've got news for him - my iPhone is already useful enough to be an assistant. Perhaps if his phone had a mature app platform and a decent web browser he would understand the concept and it wouldn't seem so foreign to him!
Quote:
According to the executive, who is a former Apple employee, it still remains to be seen whether customers will take to talking to a phone and not another person. “We’ll see how pervasive it gets,” said Rubin.
Huh? Talk about a false dichotomy - why is it always either/or with these clowns?
Quote:
He did point out, however, that one of the co-founder of Android had worked on a cellphone speech company. Google itself has already built a measure of voice recognition functionality into Android, though the technology is not as advanced as Siri.
"Well, it's not a bad idea - it's just our implementation sucks so we don't want to really talk about it"
Quote:
It's unclear what exactly Lees meant by the comment, however, as Siri allows users to run searches on Google, Bing and Yahoo, in addition to providing access to a set of services, including Wolfram Alpha, Wikipedia and Yelp.
Another clueless competitor that is unfamiliar with that about which he is panning. Pathetic.
Quote:
According to the report, Lees implied that Microsoft would avoid having its users speak commands to their phones in public.
And an iPhone 4S user can't avoid speaking command their phones in public if they want to?
So iPhone 4S users have a choice of when to use it, but Microsoft is going to prevent it by not offering it at all?
Brilliant! It's not a gaping hole in our product line, but a feature!
Quote:
While Apple's competitors may doubt Siri's usefulness, millions of customers have already voted with their wallets.
Bingo. Here's the money point - literally. Sigh.... flummoxed may have been way too kind....
Many have downplayed Siri as something weird... Why would you be ashamed to put the phone to your face and speak to it? Isn't that what talking to someone looks like? lol
Isn't one of the real breakthroughs with SIRI on the iPhone 4S the integration of SIRI speech recognition software with artificial intelligence software like WolframAlpha.
If that is what is happening here, then we can look forward to some very, very impressive phones in the future - not just 'smartphones', but 'bloody genius phones'.
Microsoft and Dragon Speaking have been at it for almost 20 years, and Apple comes along and does it in 3.
Actually the speech-to-text is licensed from Nuance, the makers of Dragon. Siri provides the AI - the contextual capabilities and natural language responses.
Remember when Apple bought Siri and the clueless analysts thought Apple was gearing up to compete with Google in search? Watch the All Things D interview with Steve Jobs from 2010 - he makes it clear Apple bought Siri for their AI. We now know exactly what he meant.
Quote:
If the iOS is the future of computing, then Siri is HAL 2000 in reality.
Indeed! It will only get better as Apple pours more resources into it and the team gets to analyze the way people try to use it and Siri responds. I can't wait to see this mature over time!
Even if that were true, it would just be an extension of what Google has been doing with Gingerbread since late 2010.
Using voice to interact with your phone is not a new concept to android.
Nor is it to apple. Heck, even one of then old shuffles had voice control. And if they android do go on to develop this as a feature, they are clearly indicating that they don't believe a word of the criticism they're currently levelling at apple. Why develop a technology if it's pointless?!
don't you think SJ made a lockout deal to keep it from others
that's the advantage of using your $$$ to protect your future
funny it comes out now
my thoughts
these bozos (sorry bozo) checked with nuance and found a barrier to them implimenting this tech i mean stealing the tech and its a no go
SJ didn't leave this world without a way to protect his baby this is why we didn 't get the ip4s in june he was still in negotiations protecting his baby
so the timeing makes sense dis it when you can't get it
Comments
For now, however it's not much use, especially outside of the US.
In the UK Siri will not look up any map or business information, simple questions seem to throw it off. A mind numbing example hit me yesterday.
I was walking home, it was raining so I was holding my umbrella, I'd forgotten my watch at home and so asked Siri for the time. I said, "what is the time" Siri responded "I do not know what the time is on Newport Road". All the stupid thing had to do was look at the clock on my phone and read it to me. It will give me the time in bangkok or any city/country in the world but will not simply give you the time as displayed on your iPhone. In the end I asked it for the time in London as that's the time for the UK as a whole. Honestly now how ridiculous is that?
I've found many areas where Siri is unable to do the simplest thing, contacts that have only a forename for example really seem to non-plus Siri.
I look forward to the improvements that Apple will make with Siri, but for now it can't even perform half of the tasks that it's supposed to be able to do, especially outside of the US. Very dissapointing.
Personally, I have no issue with using a digital personal assistant, in public or in private. I think Siri is very useful right out of the gate and will only get more so.
Perhaps they don't see the value of Siri. Perhaps they criticize it simply because they cannot compete with it (yet) or because they are trying to move attention away from Apple and on to their devices.
We see this time and time again. Apple releases a product. Their competition publicly criticize it and in some cases openly mock it, only to then turn around and copy it in the coming months. Steve Ballmer's comments on the iPod, iPhone and iPad come to mind. He publicly slams everything that Apple does. I think that Ballmer does this not because he thinks that Apple's products are bad, he does it because he thinks that they're good.
I think that they really know that Siri is pretty amazing, especially for a beta, but really, Apple is their competition. You cannot expect them to publicly say how great it is and that they wish that they had it as well. They're never going to say that.
And in a few months they will bring their own Siri-like assistant. What a bunch of tools.
Android has had voice command capabilities like forever. iOS's version, good as it is, is just playing catch-up.
Unless Siri works near flawlessly, the novelty will wear off and only a few will use it.
And in a few months they will bring their own Siri-like assistant. What a bunch of tools.
Android has had voice command capabilities like forever. iOS's version, good as it is, is just playing catch-up.
I think the novelty of Siri is already starting to wear off (which is WAY sooner than I expected). I myself was all over the blogs looking at Siri's responses to random questions. My friend I believe put it best, "It was the most entertaining 10 hours of my life. I'm wondering if I'll ever use it again though."
That is exactly as I would expect for the vast majority.
However, there may be a few people who continue to use it after the novelty wears off. I used to use the voice dial on my old Motorola phone because it worked well. When I got an iPhone, I gave up because Voice Command worked like shit.
I think the novelty of Siri is already starting to wear off (which is WAY sooner than I expected). I myself was all over the blogs looking at Siri's responses to random questions. My friend I believe put it best, "It was the most entertaining 10 hours of my life. I'm wondering if I'll ever use it again though."
Thank god such people are tired of Siri! Now that you are done burying all of your bodies and declaring your undying love and asking the meaning of life, maybe the rest of us who actually use it can have a better experience.
I am womanless and would love to have her (SIRI) in my life.
Apple is not the right brand for Geeks. Apple is way done with the Geek market.
Let's see how long it takes Google and Microsoft to copy it.
It was a nice idea, ultimately best for sending messages while driving but I would agree it's not much of a threat. It will never become the standard way of using your phone, the same as people don't control there PC's via voice despite it also being perfectly possible. I also think the same for the next Xbox update, people will be able to control the whole Xbox dashbord via voice, but they will still use the controller.
It will never become the standard way of using your phone...
That's funny. It's already the standard way I use my phone. Over 50% of my phone interaction is Siri. Additionally, it surfaces functionality that I would have never used without Siri. I don't believe I am alone in this.
Google Android boss Andy Rubin and Microsoft's Windows Phone head Andy Lees have both publicly criticized Apple's new Siri voice assistant and questioned its usefulness.
Based on the past performance of features these clowns panned, this means Siri is going to be the differentiator between the iPhone and the competitors going forward
Rubin, who currently serves as Google's senior vice president of mobile, said in an interview on Wednesday that he doesn't "believe that your phone should be an assistant.”
“Your phone is a tool for communicating. You shouldn’t be communicating with the phone; you should be communicating with somebody on the other side of the phone,” he added.
Good grief, is he positioning himself for a position at Gartner in the future?!? Your phone shouldn't be an assistant? I've got news for him - my iPhone is already useful enough to be an assistant. Perhaps if his phone had a mature app platform and a decent web browser he would understand the concept and it wouldn't seem so foreign to him!
According to the executive, who is a former Apple employee, it still remains to be seen whether customers will take to talking to a phone and not another person. “We’ll see how pervasive it gets,” said Rubin.
Huh? Talk about a false dichotomy - why is it always either/or with these clowns?
He did point out, however, that one of the co-founder of Android had worked on a cellphone speech company. Google itself has already built a measure of voice recognition functionality into Android, though the technology is not as advanced as Siri.
"Well, it's not a bad idea - it's just our implementation sucks so we don't want to really talk about it"
It's unclear what exactly Lees meant by the comment, however, as Siri allows users to run searches on Google, Bing and Yahoo, in addition to providing access to a set of services, including Wolfram Alpha, Wikipedia and Yelp.
Another clueless competitor that is unfamiliar with that about which he is panning. Pathetic.
According to the report, Lees implied that Microsoft would avoid having its users speak commands to their phones in public.
And an iPhone 4S user can't avoid speaking command their phones in public if they want to?
So iPhone 4S users have a choice of when to use it, but Microsoft is going to prevent it by not offering it at all?
Brilliant! It's not a gaping hole in our product line, but a feature!
While Apple's competitors may doubt Siri's usefulness, millions of customers have already voted with their wallets.
Bingo. Here's the money point - literally. Sigh.... flummoxed may have been way too kind....
Says the guy defending the company that stole its new notification system.
Yeah, the notification system. Big deal.
Google stole the whole freakin Operating System from Apple. LOL
If that is what is happening here, then we can look forward to some very, very impressive phones in the future - not just 'smartphones', but 'bloody genius phones'.
Microsoft and Dragon Speaking have been at it for almost 20 years, and Apple comes along and does it in 3.
Actually the speech-to-text is licensed from Nuance, the makers of Dragon. Siri provides the AI - the contextual capabilities and natural language responses.
Remember when Apple bought Siri and the clueless analysts thought Apple was gearing up to compete with Google in search? Watch the All Things D interview with Steve Jobs from 2010 - he makes it clear Apple bought Siri for their AI. We now know exactly what he meant.
If the iOS is the future of computing, then Siri is HAL 2000 in reality.
Indeed! It will only get better as Apple pours more resources into it and the team gets to analyze the way people try to use it and Siri responds. I can't wait to see this mature over time!
Even if that were true, it would just be an extension of what Google has been doing with Gingerbread since late 2010.
Using voice to interact with your phone is not a new concept to android.
Nor is it to apple. Heck, even one of then old shuffles had voice control. And if they android do go on to develop this as a feature, they are clearly indicating that they don't believe a word of the criticism they're currently levelling at apple. Why develop a technology if it's pointless?!
don't you think SJ made a lockout deal to keep it from others
that's the advantage of using your $$$ to protect your future
funny it comes out now
my thoughts
these bozos (sorry bozo) checked with nuance and found a barrier to them implimenting this tech i mean stealing the tech and its a no go
SJ didn't leave this world without a way to protect his baby this is why we didn 't get the ip4s in june he was still in negotiations protecting his baby
so the timeing makes sense dis it when you can't get it