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As someone that switched from Android to the iPhone I'm sure going to miss built in Google Now. I loved getting real time traffic alerts without having to open Waze. I could get in my car, start driving, and Google Now would automatically alert me of any traffic ahead. Or tell me my drive time to work based on the traffic situation.
 
Heck the "I'm a Mac" commercials were sort of trying to imply that all PC people were geeky with no style.

No they were not. They never attacked the users. Windows has been always known as an OS used for a business computer because Microsoft never advertises it otherwise. They focus on Office, they focus on enterprise and they focus on exchange server which is all about Work. Couple that with Windows primarily being used in the business world and not well known for being used in the music world or in the arts like the Mac has always been well known for. That's why Apple had the PC guy dressed in a suit. Blame Microsoft for that.
 
What's important here is context.

Touting context in a national ad is a good thing for everyone. We were supposed to be in the contextual awareness revolution by now, but what little contextual awareness iOS has has not changed in a few versions/years.

Our smart phones are pretty dumb without contextual awareness. Go Microsoft.
 
Why?

Considering how messy Apple is at the moment, Windows is becoming more attractive again. If you already pay a premium for a device, you'd expect it to work flawlessly (and not to be as buggy as Yosemite or unfinished as iWork for iCloud for example).

Windows hasn't been an attractive OS since XP. Vista was a complete mess, which is why 7 was popular (it was actually usable). Win 8/8.1 is a terrible user experience. It runs like crap on my parents' budget Toshiba, and they hate trying to navigate the dual environments.

OS X isn't perfect, but it's more stable and reliable than any version of Windows I've ver used with, perhaps, the exception of 3.1.
 
Really, xSeaside? Have you even touched a device with Yosemite, iWork, or iCloud on it recently. Is it flawless? Of course not. But "messy?" You're out of your mind. And, how much did you pay for Yosemite? Quite a premium, is it?

I've been running Yosemite since the day it was released to the public on my rMBP 13" late 2013.

Of course I paid for Yosemite like everyone else who bought an Apple machine! Not directly but how do you think Apple finances their OS development? This is well calculated by Apple and that so called "free OS upgrade" is included in the price of every Apple product you buy.

I said Apple is "messy" not the OS itself (although it felt messy with the broken WiFi). Maybe Apple has grown too much and too fast.
 
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Microsoft had a go at Apple.

Apple fans be raging!!!

Classic click bait article , and like fat kids to a muffin....

Fact is Sriri does suck, and could do with some loving..... Best products in 25 years kids!!!!!

I dislike all the assistants, though cortana sounds the best by far.
 
And now YOUR argument is pointless. Microsoft for the last 15 years has had more marketshare on Windows desktop than the Mac OS. Yet Microsoft has been behind on features for many years, endlessly playing catchup with Apple to try and attract more people to like using Windiws rather than being forced to use it.

OMG.... Microsoft has more markert share on windows desktops than on Mac Os has on windows desktop..... maybe cause you can't install OS X on a windows desktop officialy ;)
 
congrats to m$ for being late.

would have made an impact when siri was first launched. now it's just barking up the wrong tree.
 
I know sometimes this is a matter of YMMV, but this search string actually worked for me. Siri kept wanting to add something to the end that I didn't say, such as "Giant African Snails _home_" and "Giant African Snails's", but it found some pictures, served up by Bing. :)

I was driving along and heard NPR talk about invasive "Giant African Snails". Naturally, I'd say "Show me a picture of a giant african snail". I could never get Siri to understand. In the end, I opened safari + keyboard + microphone and googled it with voice.

This makes siri, in my mind, a "learn what to say to it" service, instead of a "learn what not to say to it" service. If you know how to ask a question, it's just fine, but it's knowing the questions it knows that's the frustrating part.
 
At the risk of sounding like a dumbass, what's the difference between what Cortana can supposedly do and the reminder buttons when someone calls in iOS?

The idea of doing one hands free and there other not is a good one of the top of my head.
 
That's not Siri's current voice. Siri's speech quality was overhauled 2 iOS versions ago. It now sounds nothing like what's used in this ad.


Is it even legal for MS to do that?
 
nope, that works. 25 new messages since yesterday.

So this thread has informed me.

This is a case where I tried something Siri related and, as the odds favor, it didn't work, so I never tried that thing again.

And that's kind of my point. I do not feel, as a potential user of Siri, that it's improving at any measurable rate where I think a re-attempt is in order. In iOS6, if it couldn't do stuff, I forgave. In iOS7, there wasn't much publicized improvement, so I carried on with my same old set of stock commands: "Set alarm for...", or "Call [person]". That's just about it. iOS8? Did they mention Siri?

But after two years of saying "Play a Pink Floyd album", and it just shuffles up every Pink Floyd song, I just quit trying anymore. The guys at Apple will never translate the command "play a [artist] [album]" to mean something other than "play any ol' [artist] song" despite likely having loads of records in their database of failed user intent translation. Siri may become like Dashboard - absorbed, promoted, demoted, and forgotten.

But, yes, evidently, NOW it shows me my Mail, but it didn't used to, and nothing made me ever want to try again, except this thread. And that is the failure here- the loss of expectation or even experimentation. I don't expect Siri to work for commands other than I know it knows, so I do not try.
 
Yes, it is legal. Why wouldn't it be?

Because MS is comparing their 2014 assistant's voice quality to Apple's from 2012. When in reality Siri's 2014 voice quality is measurably better than what's shown in the ad.

It's like a car company saying their latest 2015 sedan is better than a competitor's from 2012. But failing to mention that their competitor released a redesign since.

It's deception. And false advertising.
 
Because MS is comparing their 2014 assistant's voice quality to Apple's from 2012. When in reality Siri's 2014 voice quality is measurably better than what's shown in the ad.

It's like a car company saying their latest 2015 sedan is better than a competitor's from 2012. But failing to mention that their competitor released a redesign since.

It's deception. And false advertising.

It isn't false advertising unless the stuff they're saying Siri can't do is wrong. Deceiving people isn't illegal either.

If the content is wrong, point it out. If all you have is that they used the wrong voice, it's a sign their ad hit a sore spot.
 
It isn't false advertising unless the stuff they're saying Siri can't do is wrong. Deceiving people isn't illegal either.

If the content is wrong, point it out. If all you have is that they used the wrong voice, it's a sign their ad hit a sore spot.

I'm in advertising and film. This is misleading advertising. Apple is well within its rights (per FTC regulations) to sue. In my opinion MS is betting, and quite safely IMO, that Apple won't.

As far as your 'sore spot' mention. Whatever emotional angle you're trying to bring up is irrelevant here.

What is relevant is that MS is using misleading advertising to artificially make their product look better than the competition than it actually is.
 
I'm in advertising and film. This is misleading advertising. Apple is well within its rights (per FTC regulations) to sue. In my opinion MS is betting, and quite safely IMO, that Apple won't.

As far as your 'sore spot' mention. Whatever emotional angle you're trying to bring up is irrelevant here.

What is relevant is that MS is using misleading advertising to artificially make their product look better than the competition than it actually is.

Other than the voice, what is wrong? Anything? If they were to use the right voice, would you still be complaining? Microsoft is using things that Siri can apparently not do to make their product look better.
 
The responses used by Cortana in the ads are very carefully chosen. They're pre-recorded mp4's that play when you ask very specific questions. Any other time, Cortana sounds just like Siri. That being said, Cortana is the one single thing about a Windows phone that's better than iOS. Cortana eats a LOT of battery though (when using location based reminders).

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I'm in advertising and film. This is misleading advertising. Apple is well within its rights (per FTC regulations) to sue. In my opinion MS is betting, and quite safely IMO, that Apple won't.

As far as your 'sore spot' mention. Whatever emotional angle you're trying to bring up is irrelevant here.

What is relevant is that MS is using misleading advertising to artificially make their product look better than the competition than it actually is.

Actually these spots are a 100% accurate capabilities assessment. These spots are exhaustively vetted. Some of the stuff pointed out is two layers deep, or "theoretically correct." But correct nonetheless.
 
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