Sonos is Working on Its Own Version of Siri

[MacFan23]

My sister's family has Google Nest (or whatever it's called) in their household. They like they can just ask Google for info like on weather, events coming up (tied to their calendar, or in general), or if they need to get ahold of someone, ask it to broadcast a message. Still remember in the olden' days how people would scream at the top of their lungs that dinner is ready, or somebody needs help with something


I play clips from YouTube, and it's nice to tell it to pause, rewind or ff 'x' seconds rather than fiddling with on-screen controls ?

I think it’s one of those things that requires a relatively significant buy in to see the benefits. A speaker in most/every room and a house full of smart lights for example.

That, or experiencing an established smart home and seeing just how accessible things are these days.

 

[Saturnine]

Uh. Another voice assistant. I use them a lot but having to say “Hey Siri” in the kitchen, “Hi Mercedes” in the car and “Wassup Sonos” in the living room is tiresome.

I will petition the EU to force all voice assistant suppliers to ensure they respond to the generic “Oi you.”

 

[brofkand]

oh boy! I can't wait! psyche

 

[jicon]

I've liked Sonos... I can use Airplay 2, get pretty decent sound, and have my pick of a few different voice assistants, and music services of my choosing.

I don't use it much. Alexa, play music. Alexa, what's the news? Alexa play quiz of the day. Alexa turn off the lights...

But integration in to Hue and Apple Music has been convenient. My only technical fight with it is sometimes having to reactivate Apple Music or Amazon services.

I'd imagine there's some sort of revenue going to Amazon or Google, hence trying their hand to try their own, but if it has a decent amount of service options, and stable integrations, and still have people have option to choose what they like, then that's good, and a template for what other smart speakers should attempt -let the user decide what services they wish to use. No walled garden.

 

[mw360]

I would think it'd be cheaper to have one from someone versus building and maintaining the infrastructure for said assistant.

Having your products' functionality be reliant on your direct competitors' software is more costly than you imagine.

 

[dlondon]

Perhaps Sonos was concerned that their legal case with Google might result in Google Assistant being withdrawn which would give Amazon too much control?

 

[kc9hzn]

Sonos is a large enough company, especially in the audio sphere, that it makes a certain sense, especially if they want to stop being beholden to Amazon for access to Alexa or want to be able to advertise their smart speakers as being more private (than Alexa or Google Assistant). I personally have an OG HomePod as my smart speaker, I don’t really use it for music too often (mostly because I’m always a little worried about bothering my upstairs or downstairs neighbors, and the HomePod gets loud fast [I usually keep it between 15 and 25%, not quite room filling, especially with my current room arrangement, but more than that and I start to worry about disturbing my neighbors]), mostly I use it for home automation and weather, occasionally for launching Siri Shortcuts. I rarely use Siri on my phone or watch, but that’s mostly because, if I’m interacting with my phone or watch, I can just use them directly.

 

[wanha]

I would think it'd be cheaper to have one from someone versus building and maintaining the infrastructure for said assistant.

Are you suggesting that Sonos didn't do the math on this or that they ignored the result?

 

[jav6454]

Are you suggesting that Sonos didn't do the math on this or that they ignored the result?

"I think" not "I know" there is a difference.

 

[jclardy]

Looking forward to this a bit, only because Siri/Alexa/Google all suck right now. Literally have had issues with all three doing the one thing I ask of them - setting a timer. On Apple's side I think it is just a lack of care. Amazon has ruined the experience with ads for other skills, and google's machine learning seems to have jumped the shark to the point where it is now worse than when it first came out.

At least my original HomePods still sound good, but I'm real concerned about them getting left behind in future software updates.

 

[Corsig]

I use Siri and Alexa all the time with that said there is no reason to have another new one. Can’t see the reason behind this

 

[BB1970]

I don’t say this meanly but I don’t know anyone who uses voice assistants anymore.

When they first came out people were excited. Then it became a chore and they weren’t really improving. Still misunderstanding instructions. Still having a jerky response.

hen came bad stories that Amazon was sending recording snippets to real people to listen to them. Then people didn’t trust them anymore.

Then hacking, spying, Pegasus, ransomware, Facebook data all became bad stories.

I don’t think this damage can be fixed for a while. Maybe that’s good. Maybe we need to use our hands instead of asking a robot to do something. Maybe we need to talk to people more often again.

This post was too long to be haiku. My waifu is calling. She’s a real person.

My voice assistant queries:
1. What’s the temperature outside
2. Set timer for some oven
3. Play some album.

That’s literally it.

 

[Billy_Bob]

I don't even like Siri being Siri. Just make it stop.

Perhaps the best new feature Apple could add to Siri would be seamless integration with Alexa and Google. Imagine the convenience if you could use your HomePod or HomePod mini to control Alexa, Google, or Siri, all depending on which wakeup command you chose to use!

 

[Fraserh02]

My sister's family has Google Nest (or whatever it's called) in their household. They like they can just ask Google for info like on weather, events coming up (tied to their calendar, or in general), or if they need to get ahold of someone, ask it to broadcast a message. Still remember in the olden' days how people would scream at the top of their lungs that dinner is ready, or somebody needs help with something


I play clips from YouTube, and it's nice to tell it to pause, rewind or ff 'x' seconds rather than fiddling with on-screen controls ?

That is actually fairly useful. Problem I have is I don’t really watch much YouTube or Netflix etc these days.

 

[Amazing Iceman]

My voice assistant queries:
1. What’s the temperature outside
2. Set timer for some oven
3. Play some album.

That’s literally it.

Mine controls all the lights, TVs and A/C Thermostat.

 

[usagora]

I don’t say this meanly but I don’t know anyone who uses voice assistants anymore.

Are you an iPhone owner? If so, are you telling me you NEVER ask Siri to create a calendar event, a reminder, add something to a shopping list, set a timer/alarm, ask her the weather forecast, etc.? I'm guessing the majority of iPhone owners do at least a couple of these things and more on a regular basis and you either don't realize the people you know do this (maybe they just don't when you're around them) or you and your friends are in the minority.

 

[SBlue1]

Control lights, volume, texting, calenders, Apple tv, car temperature, etc. I use voice throughout the day and find it very useful.

Same here. Control lights, volume, asking Siri to play radio stations since I don't have an Apple Music subscription, setting alarms, asking for room temperature, asking for weather outside, adding reminders, adding things to lists. Would never trust Siri to send a message though. LOL!

 

[DogHouseDub]

The development of a proprietary Sonos assistant provides an option for users that might not love data mining companies listening in on their life. It can be small and can be local because it allows for a limited set of instructions.

I'd love to use Siri for this, but my HomePod can't default to playing music via Airplay2 on Sonos. I have to configure that manually each time.

 

[macduke]

I don’t say this meanly but I don’t know anyone who uses voice assistants anymore.

When they first came out people were excited. Then it became a chore and they weren’t really improving. Still misunderstanding instructions. Still having a jerky response.

hen came bad stories that Amazon was sending recording snippets to real people to listen to them. Then people didn’t trust them anymore.

Then hacking, spying, Pegasus, ransomware, Facebook data all became bad stories.

I don’t think this damage can be fixed for a while. Maybe that’s good. Maybe we need to use our hands instead of asking a robot to do something. Maybe we need to talk to people more often again.

This post was too long to be haiku. My waifu is calling. She’s a real person.

I get what you're saying as I'm not using it in public really around other people as it's awkward, but it does have good use cases. I use it all the time to control my various home automations and music with HomePod Mini. When I'm exercising I use it in my AirPods to control my music and respond to messages. When I'm in my car I use it to control music and respond to messages. When I'm at my Mac I sometimes use it to quickly check the weather or check what time zone a city is in since I have clients all around the world and to control automations.

So really it boils down to basically home automation, messages, music, and weather for me. I don't really use it to look up info. I notice my kids do that more often. But I only trust Apple with my privacy and see zero point in creating new assistants at this point for each appliance I have.

 

[Icewarm]

I'd much rather they work on their software. Library management on the app sucks. No per folder sorting rules. Instead of focusing on what they should, they're focusing on something that others do better. I get they don't like Google but its a waste of their resources IMO.

 

[Icewarm]

The development of a proprietary Sonos assistant provides an option for users that might not love data mining companies listening in on their life. It can be small and can be local because it allows for a limited set of instructions.

I'd love to use Siri for this, but my HomePod can't default to playing music via Airplay2 on Sonos. I have to configure that manually each time.

What makes you think they won't mine the data?

 

[contacos]

I have 4 echo but I only really use it to turn on / off lights, play music or ask for the weather / news. Everything else is just too complicated to remember so I prefer to just do it myself from the phone. For example I can never for the life of me remember how to put the lights into a specific Hue scene but I also can’t be bothered to memorize it.

i know it can also control my TV or Xbox but it’s just too exhausting.

 

[davidjschloss]

I don’t say this meanly but I don’t know anyone who uses voice assistants anymore.

When they first came out people were excited. Then it became a chore and they weren’t really improving. Still misunderstanding instructions. Still having a jerky response.

hen came bad stories that Amazon was sending recording snippets to real people to listen to them. Then people didn’t trust them anymore.

Then hacking, spying, Pegasus, ransomware, Facebook data all became bad stories.

I don’t think this damage can be fixed for a while. Maybe that’s good. Maybe we need to use our hands instead of asking a robot to do something. Maybe we need to talk to people more often again.

This post was too long to be haiku. My waifu is calling. She’s a real person.

I use Siri all day, every day. From scheduling meetings to adding reminders in Things to turning on and off things in my house. I send text with it, send intercoms with it.

I’d love is Siri had more practice functionality, but voice assistants are part of my everyday workflow.

 

[HiRez]

Unless you can control HomeKit with it, I'm not interested. Of course of the 12 Sonos speakers I have, only one of them (the tiny Roam, in the shower) has a microphone in it for voice commands. It's a little weird to have Apple HomePod Minis sitting next to Sonos speakers all over the house, but it works OK.

 

[downpour]

In the future talking to AI will feel like talking to a real person. People don’t realise yet how mind blowing this is going to be.