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Microsoft's Digital Assistant Cortana May Be Heading to iOS and Android
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I know for a fact that the moon is made out of green cheese. A little green Martian told me.
I wish Siri was given a lot more love at apple. Remember when it was a major selling point to iPhone 4s?
I use her from time to time and I still find myself saying "oh that's neat", but she could have been a star on the apple watch. Maybe she is, but I would have loved to have seen apple completely overhaul her abilities and showcase her convenience on the watch. That would have been a knockout combo.
For instance, instead of opening the shazam app to determine a song name, they should have just asked Siri and let her do the work. That would be the best iOS for the watch, simply speaking.
I use her from time to time and I still find myself saying "oh that's neat", but she could have been a star on the apple watch. Maybe she is, but I would have loved to have seen apple completely overhaul her abilities and showcase her convenience on the watch. That would have been a knockout combo.
For instance, instead of opening the shazam app to determine a song name, they should have just asked Siri and let her do the work. That would be the best iOS for the watch, simply speaking.
I agree. I'm in the Apple ecosystem, but I have tried using Cortana on other peoples Nokia phones and it is amazing.
I never use Siri, because it is actually slower than just typing stuff into google myself, and it doesn't understand speech or context that well. Actually Siri is pretty useless to me.
But when I see people using Cortana for everything I am blown away by how much they can do with it, how useful it is, but mostly by how much they actually use it - not just the speech functions, but the whole suite of features.
Cortana is much better than Siri.
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Android is the number #1 operating system in the world based on Market Share.
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Android is the number #1 operating system in the world based on Market Share.
And well, very very far in profit share. Pretty sure OEMs would rather win that latter race.
Personally I have never seen anyone use Cortana in the wild, but then again I cannot recall anyone using Siri either (except myself on the odd occasion).
I tried Siri a couple of times, and thought it was novel, but then I turned it off in my Settings and never looked back. I have no idea why people would need to use a voice activated assistant on their phone when they could just as easily punch the information in themselves, look things up themselves, etc. Plus I'm not going to do anything to help these tech companies in their quest to gather data on me, including a perfect voice print.
It cracks me up when Android fanboys try to show off to me how they look things up by voice, when I get the same results in the same time or less simply by typing things into a search. Plus they look ridiculous talking into the bottom of their phone like a circa 1998 Nextel user.
I can appreciate the desire to maintain privacy! Apple seems to be the least of the offenders in this regard. It sets them apart from Google in my mind.
Siri can get some things done faster than my fingers if he does what I want the first time. After he gets something wrong, I am left wishing I had not bothered. I occasionally rely on him when my hands are busy doing dishes or driving. The data connection and a quiet room are the limiting factors. This tech will get better, but I am surprised at how slow Siri has progressed when I hear such glowing reviews of Cortana.
I've had a good laugh at the "Cortana is better than Siri" comments. They're way off.
I'm running a Tech Preview of Windows 10. I have a few iOS devices that are running iOS 8.
Both use Bing as a back end. I've seen the same - erroneous - response by Cortana and Siri.
Coming from a Google almost-hater, Siri started sucking balls when Apple switched from Google to Bing. I make my inquiries via the Google app or Wolfram Alpha now and don't have to deal with Bing-related BS responses.
Cortana = Over-hyped junk
I'm running a Tech Preview of Windows 10. I have a few iOS devices that are running iOS 8.
Both use Bing as a back end. I've seen the same - erroneous - response by Cortana and Siri.
Coming from a Google almost-hater, Siri started sucking balls when Apple switched from Google to Bing. I make my inquiries via the Google app or Wolfram Alpha now and don't have to deal with Bing-related BS responses.
Cortana = Over-hyped junk
I think that is the defining difference between Siri and Cortana. Siri is really just voice input to replace touch input functionality, whereas Cortana is more intelligent.
It's a lot more like a personal assistant in that it has some neat proactive features.
This article talks about them expanding that a lot more but also into Desktops.
No wonder you think it sucks then. I'm running Windows 10 on a little throwaway laptop, and Cortana there is buggy as hell, and doesn't have even a 10th of the capabilities of the WP version yet.
Like on a Windows Phone, I can ask it "what's the weather going to be like today", and it'll give me a popup and a voiceover telling me what to expect. On Win10, that question confuses it. You have to say "weather" and nothing else to get the popup, and then you don't get the voiceover.
So we now can decide which is smarter?
The only thing i think, while Cortana may be useful to iOS its still a direct competitor. ....
Why would u wanna bring something over to as a direct technologu your competing with ?
That's like saying, "i'm not going to do something", then give up, and do it anyway...If it works, it works.... But to me that fi e ,ine u call "a direct competitor' between technologies is blurred.
The only thing i think, while Cortana may be useful to iOS its still a direct competitor. ....
Why would u wanna bring something over to as a direct technologu your competing with ?
That's like saying, "i'm not going to do something", then give up, and do it anyway...If it works, it works.... But to me that fi e ,ine u call "a direct competitor' between technologies is blurred.
Profit is number one to the average consumer. I know how happy I am that my electric company just raised their rates and my bill went up $40 month. I'm hoping they have a huge profit for 2015.
This could be a boon for windows 10 laptops and desktops. Microsoft has been losing market share to chromebooks and macbooks. Cortana is going to be baked into windows 10 and I'm sure it will have more functionality then the ones on ios or android. IF someone tries and likes cortana on ios or android it may not affect their phone purchase, but all else being equal it could sway them away from chromebooks or macbooks.
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Hey, it just means you'll get high quality, more innovative electricity in the future. When the water company raised my bill an extra $15 a month, I ended up getting better tasting water, I swear.
Like customs are really concerned about profits for multi billion dollar companie The truth be told that Android is the number #1 OS in the world. No matter how people try to twist it.
I think the better way to put it is to say that marketshare isn't a direct indicator of the health of a company. Most anyone would say that Google is doing pretty well for itself, but Apple isn't exactly suffering even with their considerably smaller share of the market.
Though marketshare and profits both are really nothing more than fanboy bragging points. As long as your favorite company is making a goodly chunk of money, and has enough marketshare to garner continued attention, then it doesn't really matter.
It is good electricity. My computer is much faster than it is on a competing power companies electricity. I have actually run careful benchmarks where the only variable was the electric company and my company produced the best results.
My electric company is better. It might not have the specs yours has, but everyone knows the average person doesn't care about specs. It's all about the user experience.
It doesn't matter how many gigawatts of amperage you have if you keep getting power outages every other day. My power stays on for months at a time.
But my electric company is the most expensive and makes the most profit. Specs mean nothing, profit is all I care about. I'm switching insurance companies too. I found a new one that charges more and has excellent margins to boot.
I'll throw you the ball bud, why should people care about market share for smart phones or even connected devices? Especially since most of them are not even on the same Android version or hardware capability making this large number useless to developers. The fact most of those buyers don't buy apps either doesn't help.
And there is no twist. Most of those OEM will be dead in 5 years because you need money to stay in business.
BTW, Wallmart is also the #1 retailer in the world but I'm sure that if someone could buy their clothes at Bloomingdales or Saks instead, they would select that instead.
Cheap doesn't equal quality, yet produce big sales volumes. Big surprise (not!).
As for profits not mattering... People care about quality and they are ready to pay for it. Profit is related to quality because it provides the company money invest massively in R&D for future products. Samsung & LG will survive unlike other makers because they make money elsewhere than their mobile division.
Google subsidizes Android by making money elsewhere, but even can be undercut by Chinese makers not using any Google services. If those Chinese makers sold a lot outside China, Google would be in trouble in the mobile sphere.
A non profitable company will not be able to invest to differentiate its products, making them vulnerable to commodity pricing, further eroding their competitiveness. Making their products basically all like the others. The result of low or no profitability is stagnation like in the desktop PC arena. You get cheap, bland products with very little advancement from a generation to the next. That's why profitability matters.