Enhancements Coming to Google Assistant Set to Rival Siri Improvements in iOS 11

[69Mustang]

I would never allow google to use my voice. I would feel uncomfortable considering their stance on privacy which is a stark contrast compared to Apples. Also, it’s easier for them this way because they have Google’s entire back catalog to rely upon. It’s basically a voice assistant search engine which google takes advantage of because they track what you search and now ask for. I have much more respect for Apple due to this. It may be behind in some areas but I’d take some slight drawbacks considering the above.

This post was written by someone who doesn't understand how Siri works. Probably doesn't understand how Google assistant works either, but definitely doesn't understand how Siri works. Generalizing by claiming Apples privacy policy is hindering Siri is a cop out that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Apple collects plenty of Siri data and all of that data is cumulative (until and unless you reset it). Your excuse also ignores Siri's deficiency with queries that have nothing to do with your personal information. I am at a loss as to why Siri got surpassed by other assistants. Lack of information isn't an excuse to lean on though.

 

[djs71a]

The article mentions the Google search app, but the picture of of Google Assistant. Those are two different apps.

 

[tito2020]

Title should read Siri improvements set to rival Google voice recognition technology

yes lol

 

[Hastings101]

They really need to open Siri up to more third party apps. Maybe Apple has done this and Spotify/Youtube etc haven't taken advantage of it, but it would be nice to say "play x" and have it come from somewhere other than Music app.

It would also be nice to have a bilingual Siri option that could, for example, take commands in English and Chinese or something ( though I know this is probably useless for a lot of people).

 

[agsystems]

Just watched the full video and all the exciting stuff falls into the next version/next year and many of them failed on the first try - the last video I saw of Siri (IOS10) vs Google assistance, Siri did quite well. Siri works for me in the car with the limited things I ask but I can see Google pulling ahead since they are also the world's main search engine

 

[Lloydbm41]

You do realize the amount of steps your leaving out? Either you work for Google or simply anti-Apple.

How did your wife activate google asst on the iPhone?

How often does the Chromecast break and need to be reconnected?

What about security, your wife doesn't care that the kid next door can hack Chromecast and access what you streaming very easily?

How about the FACT that Google actually allow their employees to view your photo AND know who took those photos, when and where?!

Then that lead us to the FACT that Google also tracks her and your polictical views, who you support, what causes you support, health issues you've researched, etc etc etc...

All that aside, no one has mentioned the important FACT about iOS 11 and Siri sharing "learning" via others interactions randomly... i.e. Your at a coffee shop and all the iPhones will randomly connect and learn from each other! Something that Google does NOT have the numbers on or can with Google Asst. on the iPhone.

Do you use Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat or any other media online? If you said yes to any of these you are a hypocrit.

 

[Radon87000]

Just a shame can't say ok google on iPhone to activate it

I like the fact that you can actually chat with Google Assistant. Makes it unqiue and thats why I like it

 

[neliason]

This post was written by someone who doesn't understand how Siri works. Probably doesn't understand how Google assistant works either, but definitely doesn't understand how Siri works. Generalizing by claiming Apples privacy policy is hindering Siri is a cop out that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Apple collects plenty of Siri data and all of that data is cumulative (until and unless you reset it). Your excuse also ignores Siri's deficiency with queries that have nothing to do with your personal information. I am at a loss as to why Siri got surpassed by other assistants. Lack of information isn't an excuse to lean on though.

I would say most of us don’t understand how either works. These are incredibly complex computer systems. There are very few people who really understand these sorts of things. I am a programmer with lots of years of experience but I wouldn’t claim I understand how they work because I’ve never worked on voice recognition let alone the other aspects of such a system.

Apple does collect data, but not the amounts and variety Google does. Personally I think the “don’t be evil” company isn’t one of the least trustworthy in regards to our privacy. I could see how Apple is at a disadvantage. That doesn’t mean I don’t expect Siri to be better than it is.

 

[NecroKill]

This post was written by someone who doesn't understand how Siri works. Probably doesn't understand how Google assistant works either, but definitely doesn't understand how Siri works. Generalizing by claiming Apples privacy policy is hindering Siri is a cop out that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Apple collects plenty of Siri data and all of that data is cumulative (until and unless you reset it). Your excuse also ignores Siri's deficiency with queries that have nothing to do with your personal information. I am at a loss as to why Siri got surpassed by other assistants. Lack of information isn't an excuse to lean on though.

Actually it is being held back by the data alot more than others. Certainly way more than Googles. Google has a very big head start on data mining and they probably have multiple dbs on the same account depending what is the purpose of the db.

Apples approach to data mining while not exposing specific users is not the same as what google is doing which is just shameless data mining. Precision is being lost with Apples method.

 

[genovelle]

i gave Siri another chance with iOS11 yesterday. sadly it's still terrible.
while she was very good at hearing what i was saying (everything i said was correctly written on the screen), she didn't understand anything i asked correctly.

even asking her to play the newest album of artist XY is too much of a task for her... (well at least she started to play music from that artist randomly) and that was the only tasked she almost managed to do.

Siri is no good if i have to learn which phrases she understands first.

I use it daily and know others that do as well. We don't seem to have a problem. One did though it was user error. He was not waiting for the beep, so it was not getting the whole first word which make guessing what he was talking about difficult.

 

[69Mustang]

Apple does collect data, but not the amounts and variety Google does. Personally I think the “don’t be evil” company isn’t one of the least trustworthy in regards to our privacy. I could see how Apple is at a disadvantage. That doesn’t mean I don’t expect Siri to be better than it is.

Actually it is being held back by the data alot more than others. Certainly way more than Googles. Google has a very big head start on data mining and they probably have multiple dbs on the same account depending what is the purpose of the db.

Apples approach to data mining while not exposing specific users is not the same as what google is doing which is just shameless data mining. Precision is being lost with Apples method.

Responding to you both.
Generally speaking, you both are correct. Apple doesn't and can't collect the amount of data Google can collect. Probably never (bit of hyperbole here) will have the capability to collect the amount of data can. The ubiquity of Google's reach across all ecosystems is unrivaled. That's generally speaking. That's not the argument. Siri, and the excuse of "privacy" some use for it's apparent deficiencies is the argument. Siri captures every request and that data is aggregated and analyzed to improve it. Siri is pretty good with specific tasks using specific phrasing. It's why you see a lot of Siri rebuttals start with, "I use it to set timers, alarms, and reminders." Siri's not so great processing naturally spoken requests that don't fall into most asked questions. Those types of requests have nothing to do with privacy of individuals or a lack of data because of privacy. I do think Siri lacks data, not because of privacy, but Apple's lack of a search engine. Google and Microsoft benefit from Apple user search data more than Apple.

I'm sure Apple's improvements to Siri in iOS11 will be noticeable. I'm a firm believe in everyone pushing everyone else will make them all better. I'm not a believer in the blanket "Siri's not as good because of privacy" train of thought. It just doesn't hold water.

 

[Bawstun]

Siri was introduced as a gimmick. Apple has treated it as such.

Apple is going the way of Google. Jack of all trades, master of none. Whereas Apple used to perfect each new product before release, to make it the best implementation of whatever was put there (remember how long it took iPhones to get copy/paste), now rather than *not* have a specific feature, they build the feature and let it remain mediocre or largely unusable. I miss Jobs.

 

[Rob_2811]

Siri was introduced as a gimmick. Apple has treated it as such.

Apple is going the way of Google. Jack of all trades, master of none. Whereas Apple used to perfect each new product before release, to make it the best implementation of whatever was put there (remember how long it took iPhones to get copy/paste), now rather than *not* have a specific feature, they build the feature and let it remain mediocre or largely unusable. I miss Jobs.

Not really sure you can call Google jack of all trades master of none. Their search engine has 60 + % market share.

 

[goron59]

On a hike with my wife with a really bright sun out. She takes a bunch of 4K photos on her iPhone 7S.

She has an iPhone 7"S"? Does that exist yet?

 

[adnbek]

I agree with you. My main complaint is I'm not sure what exactly Siri is for. It can't match all the functions of the built-in apps (or anywhere close), but it does things like show me sports scores - a feature not covered by any default app on the phone.

So, I'm bound to be missing a load of Siri functionality because I don't know that Siri can do it (how am I supposed to know?!). Also, when I try something and it doesn't work, I feel a little foolish and think "well, I guess it's not built for that".

Activate Siri and say nothing. It'll then offer a few suggestions. Then tap the question mark on the bottom left. All the functionality it offers is then displayed.

 

[macduke]

I'll just leave this here. Google isn't set to rival Siri because they're already well beyond Siri in terms of capability. See the screenshots below. The first one about Dwayne Johnson (the rock) was on iOS 11. The next one I was trying to get directions to a Papa Johns I hadn't picked up from before and I asked the exact same thing and it gave me the proper answer the second time. On my Apple Watch I asked when summer started (couldn't remember if it was the 20th or 21st this year) and it gave me a really weird response. Then the last one is one I've posted here before just trying to get Siri to turn up the volume and play American idiot. Again, the first one is iOS 11 and all the others were iOS 10/watchOS 3. It's not the Siri sometimes doesn't work, it's that most of the time when you ask Siri a question, she is actually mentally retarded.

 

[Lloydbm41]

I would say most of us don’t understand how either works. These are incredibly complex computer systems. There are very few people who really understand these sorts of things. I am a programmer with lots of years of experience but I wouldn’t claim I understand how they work because I’ve never worked on voice recognition let alone the other aspects of such a system.

Apple does collect data, but not the amounts and variety Google does. Personally I think the “don’t be evil” company isn’t one of the least trustworthy in regards to our privacy. I could see how Apple is at a disadvantage. That doesn’t mean I don’t expect Siri to be better than it is.

Apple collects all the same type of data as Google, in so much as what it can access. Apple is only hindered by the fact that it has less users and it's servers hold less data. But in terms of pulling data, Apple has all of it.
Where it differentiates itself from Google is the randomizing of the data, so no bit of information can be traced to a single user.
Best analogy would be: Google can listen to a thousand people screaming and pick your specific voice out amongst the noise. Apple on the other hand knows that your voice is part of the thousand screaming voices, but can't pick out your specific voice.

 

[Defthand]

Another improvement coming to the virtual AI is better contextual understanding of questions. For example, in the GDD stage demonstration, Google Assistant is first asked to show pictures of Thomas, and the AI returns images of Thomas the Tank Engine. Next, responding to the phrase "Bayern Munich team roster", the Assistant returns details of the German soccer team. Then it is once more asked for "pictures of Thomas", but this time the Assistant pulls up pictures of Bayern soccer player Thomas Müller, putting the results correctly in context to the rolling set of queries.

Siri is an assistant that can only take orders. It can't answer questions efficiently. Like all AI assistants, its guess depends on the quality of the question. Unlike competing assistants, Siri doesn't let you clarify the query with follow up comments when Siri misunderstands. It forgets everything you said prior to the last question or comment.

I don't mind if an AI assistant can't guess the context properly the first time, but it should accommodate clarifying speech inputs from me when it needs help.

 

[Vasilioskn]

LMFAO. "Rival Siri" really? My dog is more capable that Siri is. Let's get real here.

 

[stainless]

Do you use Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat or any other media online? If you said yes to any of these you are a hypocrit.

Actually, I don't. But that because I don't like my personal information out there for some random third party to "learn about me" (to some extend). Also going to FB is not the same as what I was responding to, so let's keep this on subject and comparing Apples to apples.

 

[djgamble]

LOL what a hilariously generic title. Google's unreleased product set to rival Apple's unreleased product. Did anybody else see it that way and just roll their eyes with an 'I don't care' kinda look?

I switched off and stopped caring about Siri v Google Assistant before either happened. I'll be frank, I don't like talking to my phone and I prefer boolean searches over 'plain English' searches. USELESS feature! I wish they'd can both, free up my HD, give me back a home button that can't accidentally activate Siri and spend the time working on some proper innovation.

 

[hagar]

You do realize the amount of steps your leaving out? Either you work for Google or simply anti-Apple.

How did your wife activate google asst on the iPhone?

How often does the Chromecast break and need to be reconnected?

What about security, your wife doesn't care that the kid next door can hack Chromecast and access what you streaming very easily?

How about the FACT that Google actually allow their employees to view your photo AND know who took those photos, when and where?!

Then that lead us to the FACT that Google also tracks her and your polictical views, who you support, what causes you support, health issues you've researched, etc etc etc...

All that aside, no one has mentioned the important FACT about iOS 11 and Siri sharing "learning" via others interactions randomly... i.e. Your at a coffee shop and all the iPhones will randomly connect and learn from each other! Something that Google does NOT have the numbers on or can with Google Asst. on the iPhone.

You make some valid points on Google and security, but it's not a valid explanation why this technology is still not available in Apple products. Also, Airplay is at least as buggy as Chromecast, iCloud photos sync is way to slowly, image recognition is unreliable and Siri remains completely useless. While I prefer Apple's position on security and I'm firmly locked into their ecosystem, I'm not sure I made the right choice long term.

 

[neliason]

Apple collects all the same type of data as Google, in so much as what it can access. Apple is only hindered by the fact that it has less users and it's servers hold less data. But in terms of pulling data, Apple has all of it.
Where it differentiates itself from Google is the randomizing of the data, so no bit of information can be traced to a single user.

No, Google is tracking your web searches, website visits and your usage of all their various services. It has access to more and a great variety of data. If you visit a website which uses Google Analytics, which is very popular, they are gathering all sorts of information on you.

Siri is an assistant that can only take orders. It can't answer questions efficiently. Like all AI assistants, its guess depends on the quality of the question. Unlike competing assistants, Siri doesn't let you clarify the query with follow up comments when Siri misunderstands. It forgets everything you said prior to the last question or comment.

Yes, this is a big part of the problem.

Just go to myactivity.google.com - now that is some scary stuff.

I have a Gmail account for my business, but I never sign into a browser. Thus I have no history. If I were to use social media I would only sign in on a tab in private mode.

 

[thekeyring]

Activate Siri and say nothing. It'll then offer a few suggestions. Then tap the question mark on the bottom left. All the functionality it offers is then displayed.

Thank-you! The crazy thing is, as soon as I did this I discovered Siri can be used to book an Uber here in the UK. I had no idea, and I'm actually impressed that it can.

Thanks for your help!

 

[Lloydbm41]

No, Google is tracking your web searches, website visits and your usage of all their various services. It has access to more and a great variety of data. If you visit a website which uses Google Analytics, which is very popular, they are gathering all sorts of information on you.

And you believe that Safari doesn't utilize cookies and trackers, or that Apple isn't harvesting data from your searches? i love that you guys think that Apple is as pure as the driven snow. You're wrong, but it's nice that you believe that.

Google monetizes as much as possible because that's where Google makes its money. They don't hide that fact. You can opt out of a lot of what they capture though.