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A Look at the History of Siri and How it Almost Became an Android Exclusive for Verizon

KnightWRX

KnightWRX

macrumors Pentium
Jan 28, 2009
15,046
4
Quebec, Canada
rmwebs said:
Its a very minor point. They both use the same voice technology. The only real difference is one is for android (and can perform system commands, like Siri) and the other cant.
Click to expand...

Well Google Now also does all the other nice tidbits like analysing your behavioral patterns and offering help/advice/information based around those without you having to actively request it, that also isn't available on iOS.

But yes, it is the same voice technology.
 
SmileyBlast!

SmileyBlast!

macrumors 6502a
Mar 1, 2011
654
43
Originally Posted by JaySoul
Useless until it can successfully execute "Siri, make me a sandwich."

ArchAndroid said:
At the moment, Siri would probably miscomprehend and respond with something along the lines of:

"Sorry, I don't know how to turn humans into foodstuffs."

:eek:
Click to expand...

Funny! :)

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WeegieMac said:
Shame they didn't get it ...
Click to expand...

The more Market Share the iPhone has the better off we (iPhone owners) are.
Siri could have been a huge draw for Android potential customers. Jobs had to nix that deal.
 
daneoni

daneoni

macrumors G4
Mar 24, 2006
11,596
1,146
2 things im hoping for in 2013

-Eddy Cue manages to fix Siri and Maps
-Johny Ive brings it in terms of UI refresh.
-Federighi bolsters iOS functionality under the hood.
 
B

Bantz

macrumors member
Dec 7, 2012
95
0
Siri just isn't very good. Its very bad at recognising voices. Google now is much more useful . my Google now has learned my favourite football team and tells me live football scores. It also knows when I leave work and gives me traffic reports before I leave work. Its learned all this and more all by itself. Very impressive
 
B

Bahroo

macrumors 68000
Jul 21, 2012
1,860
2
Siri works quite well for me, is it just me?? I compared Siri to Google Now on my brothers NOte 2 and they both performed great Siri could do somethings Google now cant and somethins siri cant that google now can. Both were relativly fast in searching although i will say that Siri actually gave me answers to math problems faster consistently over Google Now. The key is to just talk slow and clear and concise.

I also did a test with Siri v Google Now and i asked both to do 5+5+5+5+5 and i kept saying plus 5 plus 5, Google now couldnt keep up with all the fives i was saying but Siri got every single thing i said.
 
croooow

croooow

macrumors 65816
Jul 16, 2004
1,044
206
ds2000 said:
Siri is useless, in our house all I ever hear people using it for is "X minute timer" when cooking and the occasional whats the sport score. It is quite handy at opening apps..... unless its noisy.

We are all tech savvy people, 4 iPhone 4's in the house and we hardly use it.
Click to expand...

I am a very tech savvy person (it is my job!) with an iPhone 4. I watched a few people with their iPhone 4S or other Siri capable device a few times when it first came out and thought "that is pretty neat but not something I really need."

Since I got my iPad mini I have used Siri exactly zero times, not once. I did accidentally turn it on before, but I just exit it before Siri picks up anything.
 
D

derek4484

macrumors 6502
Apr 29, 2010
363
148
To be honest

Who cares? Siri sucks. Have to ask it questions like 4 times. Google Search is much better. It's voice translation is almost instantaneous. Siri cant even tell you when the time change is. I used Siri a few times when I got my new iphone 5 and havent used it since. More trouble than its worth.
 
Y

yegon

macrumors 68040
Oct 20, 2007
3,405
1,982
Feature with tonnes of potential, but is utterly **** in terms of accuracy and usefulness. Waaaaay too early to market and really shows Apple had absolutely nothing exciting to say about the 4S. I say that as big iPhone fan, fanboys begone!
 
C

cappadonna

macrumors regular
Jan 15, 2013
100
0
Bantz said:
Siri just isn't very good. Its very bad at recognising voices. Google now is much more useful . my Google now has learned my favourite football team and tells me live football scores. It also knows when I leave work and gives me traffic reports before I leave work. Its learned all this and more all by itself. Very impressive
Click to expand...

Not to take away from Google now, it blows siri out of the water, but of course you know it's "learning" based on what you search for. Pretty simple algorithm: "he searched for it once, show it again"

It's the implementation of that algorithm that makes Google now better than siri, but Google now can't just learn things on its own :p

I'm sure you know that already, just clarifying for those that might not.
 
F

frayne182

macrumors 6502
Oct 1, 2012
416
0
Canada
Siri is cool for a minute... The only time its cool is when someone who doesn't have it wants to see it... Or to show your grandmother how much tech has evolved.


Other then that.... never gets anything right.
 
SandboxGeneral

SandboxGeneral

Moderator emeritus
Sep 8, 2010
26,482
10,051
Detroit
MacRumors said:
... and many are looking for Apple to step up the pace of improvement with Siri in order to reestablish it in users' minds as a key advantage for Apple as it was touted at its 2011 launch on the iPhone 4S.
Click to expand...

I would be one of the folks. My biggest issue with Siri is it's speed. It's slow to process and when I don't have a good cellular signal, it's near impossible to use. I wish they'd find a way to make some of the things it does, like change songs and such, be run on the iDevice rather than on their servers.

For some things, like web searches or a quick weather update, I've been using Google Voice for iPhone because it's much faster than Siri in my experiences.
 
likemyorbs

likemyorbs

macrumors 68000
Jul 20, 2008
1,956
5
NJ
I actually use Siri a lot. Works great for me. Especially over wifi and lte, which I always have one or the other. I use it to control songs in the car mostly
 
WeegieMac

WeegieMac

Guest
Jan 29, 2008
3,274
1
Glasgow, UK
SmileyBlast! said:
Originally Posted by JaySoul
Useless until it can successfully execute "Siri, make me a sandwich."



Funny! :)

----------



The more Market Share the iPhone has the better off we (iPhone owners) are.
Siri could have been a huge draw for Android potential customers. Jobs had to nix that deal.
Click to expand...

Siri isn't even a big draw for potential iPhone customers though.

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likemyorbs said:
I actually use Siri a lot. Works great for me. Especially over wifi and lte, which I always have one or the other. I use it to control songs in the car mostly
Click to expand...

Which you could also do with basic Voice Control on the 3GS and up ...
 
KnightWRX

KnightWRX

macrumors Pentium
Jan 28, 2009
15,046
4
Quebec, Canada
SmileyBlast! said:
The more Market Share the iPhone has the better off we (iPhone owners) are.
Siri could have been a huge draw for Android potential customers. Jobs had to nix that deal.
Click to expand...

And now, instead Android owners get Google Now, which is what they would've built on top of Siri, just now instead they built it on some other voice/speech recognition engine and it still works and is advancing more rapidly then Siri.

Let's face it, Apple really bites when it comes to online services. They've failed again and again in this arena, I dunno why they don't just stop trying at this point and make strategic partnerships with firms who understand online services and can deliver good experiences to users.

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WeegieMac said:
Which you could also do much better with basic Voice Control on the 3GS and up ...
Click to expand...

Correction in bold. The old voice control didn't rely on a data connection for such offline tasks.
 
HMI

HMI

Contributor
May 23, 2012
838
319
hspace said:
But Siri is never going to out of Beta... Beta is Apple's new excuse for everything that doesn't work well. They still advertise and sell using it, but don't have to make it work as well as advertised.

So why would they ever take it out of beta? They can have their cake and eat it too, and legions of fans will defend them no matter what anyway. "It's just beta".
Click to expand...

Just like gmail, right?! How long was that in beta?!
 
U

unplugme71

macrumors 68030
May 20, 2011
2,827
754
Earth
It amazes me how many people have problems with Siri. I rarely, if ever, have a problem with network connection or understanding what I'm saying. Maybe you guys talk way to fast or mumble. Just speak at a normal pace and clearly and you'll be fine.

Siri even knows when I say "I don't know" and when I say "I dunno".

I use Siri mainly for reminders, calendar, weather, sports, launching apps, sometimes get movie times but I usually watch from home, and asking web searches.

I do wish commands for the phone itself like setting reminders were locally stored. But I can see how that can take a few GB of memory.
 
Mac21ND

Mac21ND

macrumors 6502a
Jun 6, 2007
724
167
unplugme71 said:
It amazes me how many people have problems with Siri. I rarely, if ever, have a problem with network connection or understanding what I'm saying. Maybe you guys talk way to fast or mumble. Just speak at a normal pace and clearly and you'll be fine.

Siri even knows when I say "I don't know" and when I say "I dunno".

I use Siri mainly for reminders, calendar, weather, sports, launching apps, sometimes get movie times but I usually watch from home, and asking web searches.

I do wish commands for the phone itself like setting reminders were locally stored. But I can see how that can take a few GB of memory.
Click to expand...

I have to agree. I use it quite a bit, especially if I'm driving and I need to send a quick text to someone or call someone. I don't have to take my eyes of the road.

I find the people who have problems with it are people who are asking it questions it can't answer. I'm not saying that's not Siri's fault - Siri needs access to more data - but if you know what Siri can do, it's a nice app.
 
A

AaronTheYoung

macrumors member
Jan 27, 2010
89
2
cambox said:
Siri, what a waste of space that is!
Click to expand...

It's awesome for no hands texting. I use it all the time. Siri clearly has a good understanding of the way I speak and gets my texts nearly perfect everytime.

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unplugme71 said:
It amazes me how many people have problems with Siri. I rarely, if ever, have a problem with network connection or understanding what I'm saying. Maybe you guys talk way to fast or mumble. Just speak at a normal pace and clearly and you'll be fine.

Siri even knows when I say "I don't know" and when I say "I dunno".

I use Siri mainly for reminders, calendar, weather, sports, launching apps, sometimes get movie times but I usually watch from home, and asking web searches.

I do wish commands for the phone itself like setting reminders were locally stored. But I can see how that can take a few GB of memory.
Click to expand...

I totally agree.

I'm waiting for Siri to do in bound information processing. I wish that when I was driving, Siri could ask me if I want to hear an incoming text message or automatically tell me I have a text from a VIP and then start playing it. Once it's done, she can give me the option to reply.

THAT would be a great feature and it seems so easily done. C'mon Apple!
 
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