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Samsung to Delay English-Language Launch of Siri Rival 'Bixby'

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Samsung's Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+, announced in late March, are set to go on sale starting on April 21, but one feature will be notably missing on smartphones sold in the United States - Samsung's Bixby voice assistant.

Samsung is planning to delay the launch of the English-language version of Bixby, reports The Wall Street Journal, due to performance issues discovered over the course of the last few weeks.

Galaxy-S8-800x468.jpg

The English-language version of Bixby could be delayed until the end of May, according to a source that spoke to The Wall Street Journal, but Samsung has not made a final decision on timing. A Samsung spokesperson confirmed that the Bixby service will not be available in the United States until "later this spring."
During internal tests in recent weeks, the performance of Bixby's voice recognition in English has lagged behind that of the virtual assistant's performance in Korean, these people said, and company executives are still discussing when to make Bixby available in English.
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Samsung's Bixby virtual assistant was first announced in March, ahead of the debut of the Galaxy S8 and S8+. According to Samsung, Bixby is "fundamentally different" than competing products like Siri and Cortana because it is able to be deeply integrated into apps.

Samsung also says Bixby is intelligent enough to understand commands with incomplete information and execute the commanded task to the best of its knowledge. Bixby was built on technology that was acquired from Viv, an AI virtual assistant created by some of the same people who originally built Siri.

As a major feature in the Galaxy S8, with a dedicated button on the left side of the device, Bixby's absence could deter customers from purchasing Samsung's new smartphone.

The Galaxy S8 and the S8+ feature a 5.8 or 6.2-inch AMOLED display, a 12-megapixel rear camera, an 8-megapixel front-facing camera, IP68 water resistance, iris scanning and facial recognition capabilities, a Snapdragon 835 processor, and 4GB RAM. Pricing on the S8 starts at $750 while pricing on the S8+ starts at $850.

Article Link: Samsung to Delay English-Language Launch of Siri Rival 'Bixby'
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2017/04/11/samsung-delays-us-bixby-launch/
mwd25

mwd25

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MacRumors said:
As a major feature in the Galaxy S8, with a dedicated button on the left side of the device, Bixby's absence could deter customers from purchasing Samsung's new smartphone.
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I find that hard to believe. Apparently it works.....in Korean, just something odd with English going on. If someone was considering buying this phone in the first place, I dont think the fact that one feature, albeit a major one isnt ready would stop you. The feature, I would think was designed to use english in the first place. Shouldnt be too much trouble to ask the Viv creators to take a look and sort it out.
 
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MRU

MRU

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Anyone buying the S8 was unlikely doing so for 'bixby' in fairness. Especially with Google Assistant baked in also. Now if Samsung just allowed users to map the bixby hardware button officially to support Google Assistant instead of it currently being a physical hardware reminder of a software feature neither ready or even when launching in the USA available to the vast majority of the hardwares users worldwide. (Yes forum users, there is a bigger world than just Korea and the USA) ;)
 
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dave2010

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I presume they'll be allowing users to assign Google Assistant to that button instead? I mean they surely won't release a phone with a conspicuously not working button on the side?
 
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Nevaborn

Nevaborn

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syklee26 said:
Sorry dude the most used language un earth is actually Chinese.
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I was waiting for someone to pull them up on that. Mandarin is the most used language in the world per person. However English ( not American, sorry ) is the most globally understood language, so to not support it at launch is bizarre. Again Samsung are rushing a product out instead of waiting a few more weeks to have the feature ready.

If you are not able to map Google Assistant to the physical button then your in trouble.

Isn't a physical button going backwards in 2017 anyway? Everywhere else is reducing buttons and Samsung add a dedicated one like a 00's throwback. We will have dedicated Facebook buttons again soon.
 
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MRU

MRU

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Nevaborn said:
I was waiting for someone to pull them up on that. Mandarin is the most used language in the world per person. However English ( not American, sorry ) is the most globally understood language, so to not support it at launch is bizarre. Again Samsung are rushing a product out instead of waiting a few more weeks to have the feature ready.

If you are not able to map Google Assistant to the physical button then your in trouble.

Isn't a physical button going backwards in 2017 anyway? Everywhere else is reducing buttons and Samsung add a dedicated one like a 00's throwback. We will have dedicated Facebook buttons again soon.
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Google Assistant doesn't support ALL English language regions. If you're not English USA or English UK, the assistant doesn't even work, reverting to Google Now.

So if your language keyboard is set to English (Ireland) for example you are out of luck unless you change regionality.

If Google can't fully support all English speaking countries, despite many years at the voice recognition game, Samsung should hardly be held up to a make believe higher standard ....


Also there seems to be some confusion, as it's only the voice recognition part of Bixby that won't be launching, the actual 'Google Now' style card screen (the replacement for Samsung's previous Briefing & UpDay news feed screen) with content information will still be available ... So the Bixby button will still launch that part I believe.
 
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69Mustang

69Mustang

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coolfactor said:
This is too good. I knew Samsung could not pull off a flawless launch. :p

Could you imagine Apple releasing a device with a non-working button? That would never happen.
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What non-working button are you referencing? Certainly not the dedicated Bixby button cuz it works just fine. Bixby not being available in English at launch wouldn't matter in the US anyway. S8 owners are most likely going to remap the button to Google Assistant or some of function of their choice.
 
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coolfactor

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EightyTwenty said:
Not a single person on earth was buying this phone for "bixby".
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How can you say that with such assertion? Someone will find Bixby fascinating and buy the phone to get it.

I think Samsung chose to have a dedicated button solely to differentiate themselves from the rest of the Android landscape. There will effectively be Apple, Android and Samsung choices now
 
MRU

MRU

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69Mustang said:
What non-working button are you referencing? Certainly not the dedicated Bixby button cuz it works just fine. Bixby not being available in English at launch wouldn't matter in the US anyway. S8 owners are most likely going to remap the button to Google Assistant or some of function of their choice.
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Except you can't officially remap the button. You have to use a rather convoluted third party app workaround, which the majority of S8 users (those being regular consumers, and not enthusiasts who frequent forums) will not do.


Regardless, the Bixby home screen (that which replaces the Samsung/Flipboard Briefing or the UpDay home screen) will still launch I assume when the button is pressed, as it is on the pre-release devices all the tech bloggers/vloggers are currently using.
 
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69Mustang

69Mustang

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MRU said:
Except you can't officially remap the button. You have to use a rather convoluted third party app workaround, which the majority of S8 users (those being regular consumers, and not enthusiasts who frequent forums) will not do.


Regardless, the Bixby home screen (that which replaces the Samsung/Flipboard Briefing or the UpDay home screen) will still launch I assume when the button is pressed, as it is on the pre-release devices all the tech bloggers/vloggers are currently using.
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Convoluted? It's an app. There's nothing convoluted about remapping the button. Yes, it's a 3rd party app. So's Twitter, Facebook, DJ Pro2, Fantastical. There are these things called app stores... they're full of them. Believe it or not, people actually know how to use them. The app in question has over a million downloads and a 4.2 rating. So it can't be that hard... no harder than the new Clips app.
 
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conceptvbs123

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Nov 20, 2015
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Why are people comparing Bixby with Google's Assistant?
They arent the same thing. Stop putting the two together.

Bixby is philosophically a different AI. It helps users with the navigating and doing tasks on their phone. It isnt a information gathering AI or a chatter box. It gets **** done. Simple.
 
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