Watch: Rumors of a Siri home speaker heat up as Apple heads toward WWDC

AppleInsider · May 19, 2017 5:15PM

Apple is believed to be working on a home audio device that will allow users to make Siri queries without directly interacting with other devices. AppleInsider offers a quick rundown of all the latest rumors on Apple's so-called Siri home speaker, which could debut as soon as next month.

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mkrewson · May 19, 2017 5:56PM

I'm sorry, I stopped watching when he mispronounced iOS... 😳

kidchino78 · May 19, 2017 6:19PM

I enjoy the videos immensely and I've subscribed on YouTube.. Keep em coming, please!

strangedays · May 19, 2017 6:37PM

mkrewson said:

I'm sorry, I stopped watching when he mispronounced iOS... 😳

Yeah, what the hell. Who says that?

larrya · May 19, 2017 6:45PM

StrangeDays said:

mkrewson said:

I'm sorry, I stopped watching when he mispronounced iOS... 😳

Yeah, what the hell. Who says that?

LOL - to be fair, we never pronounced DOS as D-OS

wonkothesane · May 19, 2017 6:48PM

WWDC can't come soon enough:)

fallenjt · May 20, 2017 12:55AM

Still no leak? Let's call this bullshit!

wwchris · May 20, 2017 1:02AM

Also, the A-R-M chip? You mean "arm"?

tallest skil · May 20, 2017 1:46AM

wwchris said:

Also, the A-R-M chip? You mean "arm"?

I still think “led” is easier than “Ellie D.” but who can keep up with the proper pronunciation of all these acronyms these days. I miss the days of simple acronyms like WALKATHON and HELPING CHILDREN THROUGH RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT.

soli · May 20, 2017 2:11AM

I wasn't trying to "test" Siri just now but she failed to do basic math that included a decimal point, as in "…point five". I had to change up what I said to "…and a half" for it to understand. It heard me correctly, it just didn't parse correctly. This seems like it should be working without issue at this point.

I just got home and asked Alexa who answered faster and correctly without having to alter my verbiage.

tallest skil · May 20, 2017 3:13AM

Soli said:

I wasn’t trying to “test” Siri just now but she failed to do basic math that included a decimal point…

Well, she’s probably confused. She gets a lot of hard questions.

bluefire1 · May 20, 2017 4:41AM

Wow--tough crowd here.

keno · May 20, 2017 3:50PM

larrya said:

StrangeDays said:

mkrewson said:

I'm sorry, I stopped watching when he mispronounced iOS... 😳

Yeah, what the hell. Who says that?

LOL - to be fair, we never pronounced DOS as D-OS

But, it was introduced as iOS, on stage, at an event were AppleInsider people were present. The whole video lack credibility when you don't say the name of the product you cover correctly.

jsnively · May 20, 2017 3:58PM

keno said:

larrya said:

StrangeDays said:

mkrewson said:

I'm sorry, I stopped watching when he mispronounced iOS... 😳

Yeah, what the hell. Who says that?

LOL - to be fair, we never pronounced DOS as D-OS

But, it was introduced as iOS, on stage, at an event were AppleInsider people were present. The whole video lack credibility when you don't say the name of the product you cover correctly.

Vadim was gone for the day and we couldn't re-shoot that one little bit and still get the video up on schedule. It was just a minor speaking flub, it happens to the best of us. We are adding more eyeballs to the QA chain to help make sure something similar doesn't happen again.

edited May 2017

volcan · May 20, 2017 4:45PM

I can't believe how bad Siri is. I asked her this morning "what special events are nearby today". She highlighted two events, one in Oklahoma City and the other in South Carolina. Mind you that I am in LA.

I then hen ask the exact same query to Google app and got a huge list of events nearby from kids science programs, bike races, beer tasting to lobster fest, all within a mile or two from my house.

strangedays · May 20, 2017 4:57PM

volcan said:

I can't believe how bad Siri is. I asked her this morning "what special events are nearby today". She highlighted two events, one in Oklahoma City and the other in South Carolina. Mind you that I am in LA.

I then hen ask the exact same query to Google app and got a huge list of events nearby from kids science programs, bike races, beer tasting to lobster fest, all within a mile or two from my house.

This doesn't really surprise me -- google owns a massive, searchable database of web metadata. That's its core business. Siri doesn't sit atop that data.

It it would never have occurred to me to ask Siri for things to do. I don't really consider that its job to be done, thus i'd hardly call that evidence of it being bad.

edited May 2017

gatorguy · May 20, 2017 7:22PM

StrangeDays said:

volcan said:

I can't believe how bad Siri is. I asked her this morning "what special events are nearby today". She highlighted two events, one in Oklahoma City and the other in South Carolina. Mind you that I am in LA.

I then hen ask the exact same query to Google app and got a huge list of events nearby from kids science programs, bike races, beer tasting to lobster fest, all within a mile or two from my house.

This doesn't really surprise me -- google owns a massive, searchable database of web metadata. That's its core business. Siri doesn't sit atop that data.

It it would never have occurred to me to ask Siri for things to do. I don't really consider that its job to be done, thus i'd hardly call that evidence of it being bad.

It does sound like a reasonable use case to me. Sitting around on a Saturday morning and you and the family decide to go do something fun. You could either ask Google (Assistant) or do a Google web search I suppose. Why would you (especially!) not want Siri to be all you need and avoid using Google?

edited May 2017

volcan · May 22, 2017 1:22AM

StrangeDays said:

This doesn't really surprise me -- google owns a massive, searchable database of web metadata. That's its core business. Siri doesn't sit atop that data..

It is not like it is a obcure historical data point where Google would have an advantage. This is stuff that was posted last month or last week. Why is Siri not aware of this?

k2kw · May 22, 2017 8:27AM

Soli said:

I wasn't trying to "test" Siri just now but she failed to do basic math that included a decimal point, as in "…point five". I had to change up what I said to "…and a half" for it to understand. It heard me correctly, it just didn't parse correctly. This seems like it should be working without issue at this point.

I just got home and asked Alexa who answered faster and correctly without having to alter my verbiage.

Until I see real proof of SIRI working better I see no reason to get a Watch, a car with CarPlay, AirPods or bother to use iMaps.

Siri's sad state is an anchor around lots of good Apple products. If Apple comes out with a Speaker product it needs to work as well as Alexa does now - it can't just be a good speaker to compete with Sonos.

rutherford · May 22, 2017 9:54AM

Siri has issues that need to be addressed first before it's ready to launch as a separate product category.

k2kw · May 22, 2017 10:56PM

Rutherford said:

Siri has issues that need to be addressed first before it's ready to launch as a separate product category.

That's so true. These acquisitions in voice and AI that DED has written about had better pay off dramatic improvements to SIRI otherwise it will be an embarrassment of "The Emporer has no clothes" proportions.

Watch: Rumors of a Siri home speaker heat up as Apple heads toward WWDC

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