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saintforlife

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Feb 25, 2011
1,045
329
Siri is the future. Forstall's skeumorphic designs are being purged slowly but surely. I think the interface on iOS will be just as important as Siri once Apple moves into your house.

That's the real play. When Apple can hook your appliances and home into the "Internet of Things," and you can control them using Siri, they can start to observe and learn about you-about us-as humans on a level that no other advertising firm ever has...and it will be information more useful and worth more than anyone's ever dreamed.

Your car will use her. Your house will. You will. When its a ubiquitous aspect of the way you control you music, car, calendar, TV/media consumption, A/C, etc??? That's the real end game. All those Siri requests will tell Apple who you are more completely than ever before, and in ways nobody's ever been able to put together before.
http://www.tigerdroppings.com/rant/display.aspx?sp=38319427&s=2&p=38304533#38319427

I'm excited!
 

HobeSoundDarryl

macrumors G5
So we find great fault with Google wanting to leverage it's technology to know everything about us but we are "excited" about Apple doing the same?

That whole comment (OP) seems to be something great for Apple. How is it great for us? Siri is OK but it's imagined applications in the living room has at least as many cons as pros.
 

oneMadRssn

macrumors 603
Sep 8, 2011
5,961
13,939
Completely disagree.

First- What is the obsession with Siri? Siri is just one of many voice-recognition engines. Albiet a decent one, but others have caught up and in some use-cases surpassed Siri.

Second- I find it very hard to believe people will want to talk to their house locks, their appliances, and everything they own. Most of us do not like talking to inanimate objects. It's awkward, especially in public.

No matter how good or natural speech recognition gets, some conversation will always remain awkward: "Siri, how do I get to planned parenthood?" "Siri, what's my bank account balance?" "Siri, download the latest episode of *insert terrible show you enjoy*" "Siri, it hurts when I pee" "Google, open a new tab in incognito mode" "Add my gyno appointment, next week Wednesday at 3pm" "Remind me to call out sick on Thursday so I can go to Six Flags"

Third- Although voice recognition has gotten pretty dam good, it is not even close to perfect. Some day it most likely will be, but I doubt it will be in my lifetime (and I'm pretty young). It's decent at recognizing general speech today; but compared to what we humans consider natural speech, it's still terrible. Humans can sit in a crowded room with several conversations going on at the same, and they can easily identify which voice belongs to which person, they can (if they concentrate) listen to several people all talking over each other at the same time and understand what each of them is saying. There are tests that show we can listen to and comprehend on a basic level three conversations happening at the same time (meaning, we can summarize each one after they are over). Until voice-recognition can do all of that and more, it will feel too unnatural talking to a machine. Siri right now barely knows when to question mark at the end of an inquisitive statement.

Fourth- Until the above is met, we tend to rely on using voice recognition when typing isn't convenient. Everyone has a plethora of reasons why typing isn't convenient - driving, hands are full, lazy, can't see, etc. However, I know of very few instances where people said they actually prefer to use voice recognition to typing when none of the above reasons are a factor.

I'm not saying the way we interact with technology won't ever change. However, I think we will continue to use non-verbal means of communicating with technology. Be it eye-ball tracking cameras, touch-screen surfaces, gesture-recognizing algorithms, or telekinetic control ( :p ); I am certain we won't be talking to the dishwasher.

TL;DR - Dream on, not gonna happen.
 

mic j

macrumors 68030
Mar 15, 2012
2,663
156
Completely disagree.

First- What is the obsession with Siri? Siri is just one of many voice-recognition engines. Albiet a decent one, but others have caught up and in some use-cases surpassed Siri.

Second- I find it very hard to believe people will want to talk to their house locks, their appliances, and everything they own. Most of us do not like talking to inanimate objects. It's awkward, especially in public.

No matter how good or natural speech recognition gets, some conversation will always remain awkward: "Siri, how do I get to planned parenthood?" "Siri, what's my bank account balance?" "Siri, download the latest episode of *insert terrible show you enjoy*" "Siri, it hurts when I pee" "Google, open a new tab in incognito mode" "Add my gyno appointment, next week Wednesday at 3pm" "Remind me to call out sick on Thursday so I can go to Six Flags"

Third- Although voice recognition has gotten pretty dam good, it is not even close to perfect. Some day it most likely will be, but I doubt it will be in my lifetime (and I'm pretty young). It's decent at recognizing general speech today; but compared to what we humans consider natural speech, it's still terrible. Humans can sit in a crowded room with several conversations going on at the same, and they can easily identify which voice belongs to which person, they can (if they concentrate) listen to several people all talking over each other at the same time and understand what each of them is saying. There are tests that show we can listen to and comprehend on a basic level three conversations happening at the same time (meaning, we can summarize each one after they are over). Until voice-recognition can do all of that and more, it will feel too unnatural talking to a machine. Siri right now barely knows when to question mark at the end of an inquisitive statement.

Fourth- Until the above is met, we tend to rely on using voice recognition when typing isn't convenient. Everyone has a plethora of reasons why typing isn't convenient - driving, hands are full, lazy, can't see, etc. However, I know of very few instances where people said they actually prefer to use voice recognition to typing when none of the above reasons are a factor.

I'm not saying the way we interact with technology won't ever change. However, I think we will continue to use non-verbal means of communicating with technology. Be it eye-ball tracking cameras, touch-screen surfaces, gesture-recognizing algorithms, or telekinetic control ( :p ); I am certain we won't be talking to the dishwasher.

TL;DR - Dream on, not gonna happen.
I think I would rather tell Siri to change my tv channel than sit on the couch and wave my arms around to control an on-screen menu. :D

As far as awkward public conversations go...I'm still trying to get use to people holding a conversation with themselves in public (talking on bluetooth phone).
 

bushido

Suspended
Mar 26, 2008
8,070
2,755
Germany
i dont know, i got "voice recognition" on my xbox but i still prefer the remote and barely use that feature.

how difficult is it to click the next button on your remote while siri doesnt understand me half the time or i dont even know what to say before she tries to make sense of me :D
 

Michael CM1

macrumors 603
Feb 4, 2008
5,681
276
i dont know, i got "voice recognition" on my xbox but i still prefer the remote and barely use that feature.

how difficult is it to click the next button on your remote while siri doesnt understand me half the time or i dont even know what to say before she tries to make sense of me :D

"Siri, play the Jason Bourne movie."
"OK, Jason. Which porn movie would you like to see?"
 

bozzykid

macrumors 68020
Aug 11, 2009
2,430
492
Voice definitely has its use cases on tv. Like when trying to enter a search, it can be much more convenient to say "search for bourne ultimatum." But it isn't going to completely replace the remote. Augmenting what we currently use with voice is definitely going to improve the experience. Xbox has voice for apps like Netflix and it works well. But in my experience, I can do it much faster with a remote. Saying "Xbox pause" is fun for a few days but then you just want to use the remote after that fun wears off.
 
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