Siri's Impact on Data Usage Examined

[Tinmania]

a SMALL amount, really ???

are you out of your mind ??

"please remind me to call my mother on her birthday" should be 50 bytes !! not one thousand times more !

and it should not be sent over the network at all, i really don't see why stuff like setting reminders or calling people would require a connection to a server at all !

I'm guessing that you have no idea what is actually happening when you use Siri. If you did you wouldn't have made such a reply.

You apparently have made an ignorant assumption that the voice recognition is occurring on the iPhone itself. It isn't.

How about you try to compress any amount of recorded human speech into 50 bytes. I won't hold my breath.





Michael

 

[elistan]

a SMALL amount, really ???

are you out of your mind ??

"please remind me to call my mother on her birthday" should be 50 bytes !! not one thousand times more !

and it should not be sent over the network at all, i really don't see why stuff like setting reminders or calling people would require a connection to a server at all !

Depends on what's being sent to the Apple servers, I guess. If it's the audio information, at 8 to 32kb/sec encoding (a quick Google search suggests that's typical for voice-only) then your four-second sentence is 4 to 16 kbytes. Add various overheads, including encryption I assume, and it makes sense if it's audio being sent. No idea if that's what's really going, but food for thought...

 

[Barna Biro]

Unlimited data FTW.

Unlimited money FTW.

 

[oliversl]

Great, Nice, but I need a graph, sorry

 

[Thetonyk123]

Thats pretty small. But there's still batterygate.

 

[JAT]

All responses are processed server-side, just for understanding what you're saying. It's be better on your battery life to have Apple do the crunching than your phone.

Also allows the cpu required to fit in dimensions listed in mm rather than acres.

 

[coolbreeze]

Love my 4S but I don't really use Siri for much other than "Call John Doe" tasks, once in a while. Am I the only one who is so luke warm about this feature??

I didn't think it would take long for the novelty to wear off.

1: Double click center button. Wait on prompt. Say "what's the weather like?" Siri robotically says the weather while the weather app opens.

2: Alternative: tap the weather icon.

The Siri commercials are actually funny as they try really hard to showcase this feature, but it comes off as flat to me. Yes, it's useful to say "wake me up tomorrow at 6am" but the whole Siri thing has reached it's practical marketing purpose. It's neat, but not a critical feature.

That's why I believe Apple should sell the app to other iPhone owners for, say, $19.99.

 

[MacSince1990]

I'm glad I have unlimited data because I'm surprising myself at how often I'm using Siri to set reminders and alarms.

Customers like you are what makes companies happy... completely clueless and unaware that another 20 MB/month isn't going to make a difference at all. rofl.

 

[BaldiMac]

I didn't think it would take long for the novelty to wear off.

1: Double click center button. Wait on prompt. Say "what's the weather like?" Siri robotically says the weather while the weather app opens.

2: Alternative: tap the weather icon.

The Siri commercials are actually funny as they try really hard to showcase this feature, but it comes off as flat to me. Yes, it's useful to say "wake me up tomorrow at 6am" but the whole Siri thing has reached it's practical marketing purpose. It's neat, but not a critical feature.

That's why I believe Apple should sell the app to other iPhone owners for, say, $19.99.

Are you surprised it sounds silly when you cherry pick a silly scenario?

How about you do the same thing with a headset while it is in your pocket? Or with a location that's not already in your weather app. Or when you have gloves on.

 

[coolbreeze]

Are you surprised it sounds silly when you cherry pick a silly scenario?

How about you do the same thing with a headset while it is in your pocket? Or with a location that's not already in your weather app. Or when you have gloves on.

Lol you busted me.

My point is it will always be a novelty item with some uses, many of which are more easily done as they always have been.

If one buys the 4S simply for Siri, that's pretty funny IMO.

 

[tylerk36]

Was thinking very seriously about the iPhone 4S. I have the iPHone 4. My desire was to utilize Siri very heavily. Gonna have to look at the data plans for ATT and see if there is a reasonable data plan. After all I don't want to pay $120.00 a myth just for a large data plan for Siri.

 

[Digitalclips]

Now I'm really glad we are grandfathered in with Verizon's unlimited. Siri is a member of the family now!

 

[guch20]

I love Siri to death, I really do. It's smart, helpful, and oh so witty.

But sometimes it just pisses me off. Like when I don't say things just right, or when I'm jogging and she can't understand a word I'm saying. I don't have an accent and try to speak clearly, but sometimes it's a total crapshoot.

Can't wait for the next beta stage...

 

[QuiteSure]

Siri changed everything for me

The naysayers who don't find Siri terribly valuable amaze me. I use seriously 10x PER HOUR. If I want to send an email, I use Siri. For every calendar item I create (I'm a lawyer, I create a lot) I use Siri. For every deadline, reminder, appointment, telephone call, etc. I use Siri. When I want to split a tab at the restaurant, I use Siri to figure the tip and the split. To settle a debate I invariably use Siri. To set an alarm I use Siri. To set a cooking timer I use Siri. I asked Siri to learn my best friend's nickname and when I want to facetime him, or my kids, or my fiance, I use Siri. When I want to create a grocery list, I use Siri. When I want to listen to a song by Madonna I use Siri. To send a text, of course, I use Siri. When I need to remember to do something which I would surely otherwise forget, I use Siri. When I want to make a call, I use Siri. This is the functionality I've been wanting for years.

There's a brand new book available on the Kindle (and maybe elsewhere) called Talking to Siri: Learning the Language of Apple's Intelligent Assistant by Steve and Erica Sande (from TUAW) that sells for $4.99. Well worth the price.

Siri is not 100% perfect, but I don't believe that it needs to be in order to add tremendous value. Frankly, at 80% it's phenomenal. I think its accuracy is somewhere around 94-96%, and only getting better.

 

[vitzr]

Using more data is to be expected. Siri can be a motormouth

 

[rcappo]

I would prefer, if Siri does not have network access to, that it revert to an abridged version that can at least do basic requests that do not need network access. Or at the very least revert to voice control

Yes, Siri should be able to do some tasks while not connected to the network. I don't really need Verizon or any one else knowing that my alarm will go off at 6:45am tomorrow. Or if I want to play some Jimmy Buffet while on a boat far off the coast...

 

[Glideslope]

Depends on what's being sent to the Apple servers, I guess. If it's the audio information, at 8 to 32kb/sec encoding (a quick Google search suggests that's typical for voice-only) then your four-second sentence is 4 to 16 kbytes. Add various overheads, including encryption I assume, and it makes sense if it's audio being sent. No idea if that's what's really going, but food for thought...

IMO, what is really going to be interesting is how the data reacts to Siri as it grows over the next 1-2 years. I think responses will become shorter and more precise.

Siri is gaining 2-3 new words daily from 5 million users. It will begin to incorporate these into it's AI, leading to more varied and complex responses.

Some view Siri as a toy, something you use for a week then never again. I view it as the beginning of "Computer. Scan and identify the object 1000 meters off our port side".

Maybe I'm off base. Time will tell as we look back 20 years from now.

 

[Tinmania]

The naysayers who don't find Siri terribly valuable amaze me. I use seriously 10x PER HOUR. If I want to send an email, I use Siri. For every calendar item I create (I'm a lawyer, I create a lot) I use Siri. For every deadline, reminder, appointment, telephone call, etc. I use Siri. When I want to split a tab at the restaurant, I use Siri to figure the tip and the split. To settle a debate I invariably use Siri. To set an alarm I use Siri. To set a cooking timer I use Siri. I asked Siri to learn my best friend's nickname and when I want to facetime him, or my kids, or my fiance, I use Siri. When I want to create a grocery list, I use Siri. When I want to listen to a song by Madonna I use Siri. To send a text, of course, I use Siri. When I need to remember to do something which I would surely otherwise forget, I use Siri. When I want to make a call, I use Siri. This is the functionality I've been wanting for years.

There's a brand new book available on the Kindle (and maybe elsewhere) called Talking to Siri: Learning the Language of Apple's Intelligent Assistant by Steve and Erica Sande (from TUAW) that sells for $4.99. Well worth the price.

Siri is not 100% perfect, but I don't believe that it needs to be in order to add tremendous value. Frankly, at 80% it's phenomenal. I think its accuracy is somewhere around 94-96%, and only getting better.

I thought I utilized Siri a lot. But you put me to shame! Very nice post.



Michael

 

[guch20]

The naysayers who don't find Siri terribly valuable amaze me. I use seriously 10x PER HOUR. If I want to send an email, I use Siri. For every calendar item I create (I'm a lawyer, I create a lot) I use Siri. For every deadline, reminder, appointment, telephone call, etc. I use Siri. When I want to split a tab at the restaurant, I use Siri to figure the tip and the split. To settle a debate I invariably use Siri. To set an alarm I use Siri. To set a cooking timer I use Siri. I asked Siri to learn my best friend's nickname and when I want to facetime him, or my kids, or my fiance, I use Siri. When I want to create a grocery list, I use Siri. When I want to listen to a song by Madonna I use Siri. To send a text, of course, I use Siri. When I need to remember to do something which I would surely otherwise forget, I use Siri. When I want to make a call, I use Siri. This is the functionality I've been wanting for years.

There's a brand new book available on the Kindle (and maybe elsewhere) called Talking to Siri: Learning the Language of Apple's Intelligent Assistant by Steve and Erica Sande (from TUAW) that sells for $4.99. Well worth the price.

Siri is not 100% perfect, but I don't believe that it needs to be in order to add tremendous value. Frankly, at 80% it's phenomenal. I think its accuracy is somewhere around 94-96%, and only getting better.

I use Siri for a lot of things, but for emails or anything that requires me to speak long sentences, I can't do it because Siri doesn't let you pause for more than a second before it goes off to do its thing.

And don't let it catch you saying "um".

 

[QuiteSure]

I use Siri for a lot of things, but for emails or anything that requires me to speak long sentences, I can't do it because Siri doesn't let you pause for more than a second before it goes off to do its thing.

And don't let it catch you saying "um".

What I find is that in letting go of needing Siri to be perfect she can do much more for me. She seems so eager to please, but there is a learning curve that I believe is well worth scaling. Learning how to talk to her will definitely yield the best results. Maybe you can build in Siri's doing her own thing to your workflow and then add.

By the way, you can say "add" after Siri asks you to send a text or an email, and she will add your next dictation to the end of the transcribed text.

 

[Roller]

Siri is already helpful to me when I want to do something on the iPhone, but I'm in a situation where typing would be difficult or unsafe, such as driving or walking.

One thing that I haven't figured out is how Siri handles appointments. If I try to schedule a meeting at 5 PM and there's a conflict, Siri reads the conflicting appointment to me. But if I ask it to tell me what appointment I have at 5 PM, it displays the appointment, but doesn't read it aloud. And if I ask it to read my 5 PM appointment to me, Siri responds that it can't read calendar events, which it obviously can.

 

[guch20]

What I find is that in letting go of needing Siri to be perfect she can do much more for me. She seems so eager to please, but there is a learning curve that I believe is well worth scaling. Learning how to talk to her will definitely yield the best results. Maybe you can build in Siri's doing her own thing to your workflow and then add.

By the way, you can say "add" after Siri asks you to send a text or an email, and she will add your next dictation to the end of the transcribed text.

I was not aware of that. Thank you.

 

[Tinmania]

I use Siri for a lot of things, but for emails or anything that requires me to speak long sentences, I can't do it because Siri doesn't let you pause for more than a second before it goes off to do its thing.

And don't let it catch you saying "um".

I hear ya'! I hate to adapt to a "machine" but in this case I find learning how to talk to Siri better is not such a bad thing.

A friend of mine, recently here from Cuba, struggles with English. But even if Siri did have a Spanish option now she would not use it. She is determined to speak correctly in English and I swear Siri is helping her. The day the 4S came out she could not use Siri for really anything. But now she is doing much better with it. And I can hear it in how she talks. Who would have thought...



Michael

 

[larig]

I've actually been pleasantly surpassed how frequently I use it—goofing off aside. I definitely use it for the "Call John Doe" feature, but I also use it for text messages on occasion (sometimes to initiate the message, sometimes to dictate it), text dictation, setting timers and reminders, playing music (including playlists or creating genius playlists), map lookups and directions, initiating searches, and a little more as I gradually figure out more about it.

Outside the Apple-specific features, I've found I'm using WolframAlpha queries more and more, and this use is gradually scaling with how much more familiar I'm becoming with WolframAlpha. It can actually do some pretty fantastic stuff. Hint: you can say, "Wolfram, [search]". for example, "Wolfram, what is the scientific name for weasel", or "Wolfram, random integer below 21". Edit: the more I think of it, the more I realize I use Siri for. There's math, unit conversion, information gathering (e.g. asking who someone is, or getting the definition of a word), and more. WolframAlpha has some good examples which might be made to work.

I thought it might be good, but I didn't expect to use it for a whole lot. I never used the old iOS 4 voice control feature. I'm not sure if my fondness for Siri is because I've been using it more to become comfortable and familiar with it, or if it just has to do with my specific circumstances.

this is me. When I'm cooking I ask "how many grams is 4.5 cups of flour." Or I used it to make a note of the items I had to drop off to a charity. I looked up an actors age....I use Siri all the time.

 

[edoates]

It's not Siri data by itself

30 MB a month isn't too bad at all.

It's all the other stuff that uses your data plan sort of transparently; photos to the cloud, iTunes syncing, game center, etc. It all adds up. I do have unl data, but many don't and certainly my iPad2 doesn't.

As computing and data move to the cloud, whether it's Salesforce.com or video streaming, these data limits are going to inhibit the internet revolution. I don't mind paying for a movie stream, but then if I have to pay for it again because I'm at some limit or another (consumption or speed), that makes me think twice about it.

Back in the 70's we used to ask the impact on communications if all voice telephone was priced the same regardless of distance or time. We are essentially there, and it changed business and personal behavior immensely.

So the question for the 20'teens is: what will be the impact being able to access anything, anywhere without regard for the amount or speed of the data transmission (pay only for the content). I believe that the impact would be even greater, by an order of magnitude than the telephone rate flattening.