We also all get that its connectivity is intermittent. (It's been repeated on here so many times over.) If people keep posting the same questions, they're gonna hear the same answers, until there are some new answers.
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"It just works"... Eh, not quite
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We also all get that its connectivity is intermittent. (It's been repeated on here so many times over.) If people keep posting the same questions, they're gonna hear the same answers, until there are some new answers.
You have over 4 million people hitting the Siri servers, take that into consideration. Give Apple sometime to get everything set up and properly optimize for such a large amount of people. They said Beta for a reason. I'm sure Apple didn't do testing with MILLIONS before the 4S came out, so of course there are bugs and network issues they will run into. Who knows, with future updates, what Siri may be able to do. Just be patience.
Beta means that there may be issues with the software functionality or stability. It shouldn't mean that the infrastructure supporting it is only partially built. It may seem that a billion dollar data center in NC should support Siri, but the reality is that delivering reliable cloud based services at Apple's scale requires multiple geographically dispersed huge data centers. There's a reason why Amazon, Microsoft, Google, etc. all have dozens of huge data centers.
Before Siri was shown, folks here lambasted Google for release beta products to the public. Stating that Apple would never release an unfinished product like Google does. As soon as Apple does release an unfinished product (because that is what beta means) people act like it is no big deal.
I would suggest submitting feedback when you find things that don't work the way you would expect them to (much like how Siri doesn't understand Jr, Sr, III, etc). Folks should do this even if a product isn't beta.
I would suggest submitting feedback when you find things that don't work the way you would expect them to (much like how Siri doesn't understand Jr, Sr, III, etc). Folks should do this even if a product isn't beta.
I actually never had a problem connecting until this morning. I was trying to set a reminder for tomorrow and it says it can't connect. I've tried a few times over the past few hours and no luck. Although I agree it's in beta, it's nonsense to say this wasn't their main selling point of the phone. A large portion of the keynote was on Siri. Their first US commercial for the 4S was all about Siri that aired multiple times during prime time television. I'm an Apple fanboy 100% but that doesn't mean we should be cutting them slack on this. Theres the the tech community and there's everyone else. Everyone else doesn't know what beta is. They just know that Siri doesn't work right now. The iPhone wasn't built for the tech community, it was built for everyone else. Plain and simple, Siri should be working right now.
Who's "they"? All the non-techie 'Theys' I know with an iPhone 4S mention just how much they love Siri. I don't see CNN or Fox News writing about Apple's Siri failure.
The only one of my friends and coworkers who had consistent Siri problems also had non-functioning wifi. A trip to the Apple store and one new replacement iPhone later and he's a happy camper.
I've had no luck getting Siri to work on my Iphone4.
It's like she's not even there at all.
Heartbreaking.
It's like she's not even there at all.
Heartbreaking.
you're comparing Android's lame, unused and little-known voice commander app to Apple's brand new, super hyped, commercially advertised, internationally released, 4S exclusive, revolutionary integrated Siri software that 4 million people are overloading their servers to use?
yeah, I bet you've never heard of Google's servers being unavailable
Those of you with connection issues to Siri, are you using it strictly on 3G or is that at home with WiFi or both?
I've only ever heard Siri say she can't connect while using 3G (AT&T) while driving and on WiFi here at the house it's worked every time for both me and my wife. I'm curious if Siri has more trouble over 3G (which is likely less reliable?).
If you're issues are strictly 3G related then I question Apple's ability to improve the system since it would rely on the carrier connection.
Anyways, just a thought.
I've only ever heard Siri say she can't connect while using 3G (AT&T) while driving and on WiFi here at the house it's worked every time for both me and my wife. I'm curious if Siri has more trouble over 3G (which is likely less reliable?).
If you're issues are strictly 3G related then I question Apple's ability to improve the system since it would rely on the carrier connection.
Anyways, just a thought.
I'm going to have to disagree with most. Siri was released as a major selling point of the 4S. It looks like they felt the CPU and camera wouldn't enough to get people to upgrade so they added Siri to sweeten the pot. If they were treating it as a true beta they wouldn't be marketing it as heavily as they are. They weren't able to the get the 5 done so they are relying on software to sell the 4S. But the software wasn't done either. The beta tag is a scapegoat. When people complain it isn't working they can just say "it's in beta".
It's not silly at all. The 4S is just a slightly improved version of the 4. Anyone who thinks it's a huge upgrade is just kidding themselves, period. It's still a great phone, but pretty much just the same as the last version.
Meh. Google keeps things in beta for years. IIRC, GMail lost its beta tag only about a year or so ago.
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How did you come up with that number?
I'm having trouble with it on both. My home network is fine (TWC RR service), so I don't think it's that.
they needed a killer feature to demo and to push the new phone, and Siri was not yet at the GM stage to be released as a final shipping version. So you got the beta, and all the bugs and issues that come with beta software.....
As usual, anyone daring to criticize Apple, rightly or wrongly, is jumped on...
Siri is an interesting and very promising concept that still needs work. It is still labeled beta but that really means nothing in this day and age. MobileMe wasn't labeled beta and it should have been. Google has had very polished betas out for years. It isn't the ONLY selling point for the new phone, but please - they pushed it hard as the one of the big reasons to get the phone. I'm sure that as the novelty dies down, the trouble people have accessing it will be reduced as well - at least I hope so. I would have bought the phone even without Siri, but I fully understand the OPs point.
Siri is an interesting and very promising concept that still needs work. It is still labeled beta but that really means nothing in this day and age. MobileMe wasn't labeled beta and it should have been. Google has had very polished betas out for years. It isn't the ONLY selling point for the new phone, but please - they pushed it hard as the one of the big reasons to get the phone. I'm sure that as the novelty dies down, the trouble people have accessing it will be reduced as well - at least I hope so. I would have bought the phone even without Siri, but I fully understand the OPs point.
First of all, as someone already mentioned, it being in beta should have nothing to do with not being able to connect Apple's servers.
And secondly, doesn't the 'beta' tag only refer to the limited language selection available out of the gate? Ok found this..
"Apple has already announced that more languages and services will be available soon, Viticci reports. Electricpig was first to report maps and directions wouldnt be available to Siri except for US customers; today, a number of users have confirmed that both businesses (with Yelp integration) as well as maps/traffic data arent available outside the United States.
From the sounds of that, beta refers to the language limitations, features missing in some areas and that more features will be added later. That shouldn't have any affect on the current feature sets usability.
And secondly, doesn't the 'beta' tag only refer to the limited language selection available out of the gate? Ok found this..
"Apple has already announced that more languages and services will be available soon, Viticci reports. Electricpig was first to report maps and directions wouldnt be available to Siri except for US customers; today, a number of users have confirmed that both businesses (with Yelp integration) as well as maps/traffic data arent available outside the United States.
From the sounds of that, beta refers to the language limitations, features missing in some areas and that more features will be added later. That shouldn't have any affect on the current feature sets usability.
IMO Siri is not beta for the issues of connections to server. Siri is beta for added implementation of further services and additional country additions.
So beta I believe is not intended for the lack of availability of Siri itself on the network, but rather the other missing mentioned above.
I have had numerous occasions when she just hangs, is not available, etc. in fact if I were to guess; about a 25-30% fail rate with just working. Yesterday for instance it did not work for me most of the day- both wifi and 3G.
So, I find it hard to believe that the excuse of beta is Apples excuse for Siri simply not working; rather than additional functionality and local(s).
Apple has a history imbedded in it's core to release perfection- we know it, Steve preached it, and for the most part that's why we're all here. MM, iCloud, and now Siri (so it seems) are a far cry from the norm out of Cupertino.
Apple just has a hell of a time with cloud services across the board, and I wish I knew why- because no one can deny they don't.
So beta I believe is not intended for the lack of availability of Siri itself on the network, but rather the other missing mentioned above.
I have had numerous occasions when she just hangs, is not available, etc. in fact if I were to guess; about a 25-30% fail rate with just working. Yesterday for instance it did not work for me most of the day- both wifi and 3G.
So, I find it hard to believe that the excuse of beta is Apples excuse for Siri simply not working; rather than additional functionality and local(s).
Apple has a history imbedded in it's core to release perfection- we know it, Steve preached it, and for the most part that's why we're all here. MM, iCloud, and now Siri (so it seems) are a far cry from the norm out of Cupertino.
Apple just has a hell of a time with cloud services across the board, and I wish I knew why- because no one can deny they don't.
Without Siri the 4S is nothing but a spec bump over the 4. So it's a pretty major selling point. In fact on Apple's own page, it's the first feature that appears.
Everyone. I had this same problem today and went to the Apple store to seek a resolution. There was a problem with my restore that was causing the problem with Siri. I wiped the telephone before doing the restore and everything worked perfectly. I did the restore about 3 hours ago and Siri has been working perfectly without even one network issue. And, that's after using Siri pretty heavily over the last 3 hours to dictate emails, texts and setup the service in general. Before the restore, I couldn't get Siri to work even once. And, that was after at least 50 tries today.
So, I recommend performing a restore to see if that fixed your problem. I'm certainly happy again.
The Apple rep did state that there appeared to be an issue with the Siri software getting corrupted in same cases.
Good luck everyone.
Do you have proof that every person that bought an iPhone 4S is using Siri or are you just assuming that?
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Well Gmail was in beta for what 4 years?
For the record, it has been working great for me. And commercials about dual core processors and 8MP cameras don't really linger in anyone's memory, hence the Siri commercials.
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It was a very common experience for me not to connect. In fact, I have a higher successful connection rate with Siri than I did with my Google Voice Recognition. The biggest thing is that the Google wasn't as widely promoted, so I imagine many Android users hardly use it.
1. Beta is not an excuse for connection issues.
2. Apple was probably (obviously) not prepared for the amount of traffic they are getting. Give them a little bit more time and I bet we will see the connection issues go away by the end of the week.
It doesn't matter if all 4 million are or not. Whatever it is, it is a huge number. Given how the sales of the 4S have gone it could easily be more then Apple planned on in such a short period of time.
2. Apple was probably (obviously) not prepared for the amount of traffic they are getting. Give them a little bit more time and I bet we will see the connection issues go away by the end of the week.
It doesn't matter if all 4 million are or not. Whatever it is, it is a huge number. Given how the sales of the 4S have gone it could easily be more then Apple planned on in such a short period of time.