Apple's VocalIQ takeover could hint at Siri upgrades for WWDC and beyond
Assuming it makes it into Siri upgrades that may start as soon as next month's WWDC, technology Apple acquired from VocalIQ could greatly improve the assistant's accuracy and contextual awareness, one report claims.
Prior to Apple's takeover, VocalIQ's technology scored over 90 percent in difficult accuracy tests -- compared with roughly 20 percent for Siri, Google Now, or Microsoft's Cortana, a source told Business Insider. This includes interpreting complex commands an assistant like Siri would normally fail on, such as "Find a nearby Chinese restaurant with open parking and Wi-Fi that's kid-friendly."
Apple bought VocalIQ before the company could even launch an app, and reportedly let them continue to work out of Cambridge in the U.K. on integrating their tech into Siri.
One of the most significant features of the technology is said to be its ability to remember context permanently, such that in the Chinese restaurant example a person could say "Find me a Mexican restaurant instead" an hour later and still have it remember the original criteria.
The system is said to work so well that users may never have to glance at a device's screen to confirm anything. It may also be better at filtering out ambient noise, and adapting to accents, a notorious problem with current voice assistants.
It's speculated that Apple could want this screen-free experience for two upcoming hardware products, namely its Amazon Echo competitor and/or the Apple Car. The company would presumably bring Siri improvements to all its platforms however, such as iPhones, iPads, and the Apple TV.
Next month Apple is expected to showcase a Siri SDK for third-party developers, which even without VocalIQ will expand the assistant's usefulness simply by letting more apps tap into voice commands.
Prior to Apple's takeover, VocalIQ's technology scored over 90 percent in difficult accuracy tests -- compared with roughly 20 percent for Siri, Google Now, or Microsoft's Cortana, a source told Business Insider. This includes interpreting complex commands an assistant like Siri would normally fail on, such as "Find a nearby Chinese restaurant with open parking and Wi-Fi that's kid-friendly."
Apple bought VocalIQ before the company could even launch an app, and reportedly let them continue to work out of Cambridge in the U.K. on integrating their tech into Siri.
One of the most significant features of the technology is said to be its ability to remember context permanently, such that in the Chinese restaurant example a person could say "Find me a Mexican restaurant instead" an hour later and still have it remember the original criteria.
The system is said to work so well that users may never have to glance at a device's screen to confirm anything. It may also be better at filtering out ambient noise, and adapting to accents, a notorious problem with current voice assistants.
It's speculated that Apple could want this screen-free experience for two upcoming hardware products, namely its Amazon Echo competitor and/or the Apple Car. The company would presumably bring Siri improvements to all its platforms however, such as iPhones, iPads, and the Apple TV.
Next month Apple is expected to showcase a Siri SDK for third-party developers, which even without VocalIQ will expand the assistant's usefulness simply by letting more apps tap into voice commands.
Comments
Apple Acquires Artificial-Intelligence Startup VocalIQ - WSJ
And yes, it's based in Cambridge, UK.
I really hope this improves Apple's fuzzy logic not only in Siri, but other areas such as Maps search. All my problems with Apple Maps stem from its search. I ask Siri to take me to Canterbury for example, and despite iOS knowing I frequent Canterbury often (offering directions in the notification centre), it decides I would rather drive to Canterbury in New Zealand. That's just great, since I live in the UK and Canterbury, NZ is about 12,000 miles away, and Canterbury, UK is usually less 100.
I remember iTunes search not so long ago would be thrown off by misplacing an apostrophe or adding one in when there shouldn't be any (you know how song names are unintuitive often). I believe that's fixed now in iTunes. I reported it a few times over a couple of years. Maps search feels like this often and has terrible POI gaps sometimes.
In other news my brother's car company charges €230 for a download file to update his GPS in his car with a UI that sucks donkey dick. I guess things could be worse :P
If Apple indeed does announce an Echo competitor, wanna bet it won't be anything like it?
Kinda how Apple Watch is often compared to Fitbit even though they're not even in the same league.
Whatever they announce this year in terms of integrating a their party technology with amazing features in the long run does not matter. All these companies including Apple are going to constantly work on this stuff. These voice assistants will improve over time regardless and can be updated via software with the flick of a switch—they don't even require a local update. Google will have certain advantages over Apple, and Apple will have a privacy advantage over most other companies in tech. Rome was not built in a day.
Don't be surprised if iOS 10 has a very advanced Siri.
Siri has all the pieces in place for VocalIQ already. Remember, iOS 10 won't be released in June but later in the year. More time to get it right.
iOS 10 should be released with iPhone 7, as normally Apple does, however it does not necessary include Siri with VocallQ. Hoping Apple does not dumb down VocallQ though.
I honestly never even use it, or should i say try to use it.
It would help to be able to add data to it manually so timetables (PDF, Word etc) for things like waste collection, school times, opening hours, TV guide or transport. If you add a regular transport timetable and it knows you aren't near the stop, it can alert you that you are going to miss your ride.
People would also use Siri more if it replaced Notes and Reminders, maybe Calendar. There could just be a button inside Siri to type and it would have options for making it a note or a reminder. Right now if you have to be at a specific place at a specific time, you are going to want a reminder, a map and a note of who the meeting is with or what it's about. This means the data is stored between 3-4 different apps (Maps, Notes, Reminders, Calendar, Contacts possibly Siri) and you have to make sure they are all correct but it should be done entirely with Siri and typed for accuracy.
An overview page would be nice like a daily planner that merges requests and data into a timeline. Then you could see at a glance a lot of different personalized data. It can add recommendations in the timeline like TV shows to watch, local events. If you asked about gift ideas and noted an item, it can put in the timeline to get that item or similar and notify when nearby stores have the item.
Siri under OS X could be really useful. Being able to do image and video searches and have the results show up directly without opening the browser would be very efficient. If you need a picture, just type what you want into Siri and it will show thumbnails that can be expanded and dragged into an image editor. If the results are wrong, further searches would narrow it down.
Where it improves over a search engine is being able to do things locally. You could type a search for a song e.g "latest Taylor Swift song". It would instantly show up the latest song and let you hear it. You can get the song manually. Then you could type "sync to iPhone" and it will store that on the iPhone. You could sync transport timetables from the Mac or iPad to the phone. If a timetable is an image that Siri can't decipher, it can just store the table optimally for display.
If you had a paid human personal assistant, you would give them documents and all sorts of data for them to manage and organize so that you can just ask them about your schedule and they give you the summary of what you need so you can do those things efficiently. Siri can behave more like that and less like a standard search engine responding to queries. It can be a way for you to easily build up a personal database, which I think people would find a lot more useful daily.