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Why is Siri so outdated compared to competition?

Freakonomics101

Freakonomics101

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Nov 6, 2014
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Like the title says, what's going on? Usually it hasn't bothered me but lately I've been using Siri more and 99% of the time, it searches the internet and gives me a bunch of links when the Amazon's Echo, or whatever it's called, can do so much more.

I'm truly hoping iOS 11 brings MAJOR improvements and upgrades to Siri. Apple needs to get their game on with this. They need to have that major lead in the industry like they did when Jobs was in charge. Boy, do I miss him.

Edit: Amazon's Alexa, not Echo.
 
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Providing links instead of actual answers is the equivalent to asking someone a question and then that person shows you the address of a physical library.
 
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They moved from software development for starters by and large. And focused on consumer electronics. its not a good sign when the hey look at this for software breakthroughs at a WWDC is look its the new imessage with pictures and fun things (that every other mainstream IM has already).

Google and others...put themselves beyond consumer realms and stayed here more hardcore. this stuff tends to start life on the server backend and with higher goals. these devs really aren't going my life's work is to help people find a good thai restaurant in a 5 mile radius or tell me the name of that guy in that movie...you know the one who wore sun glasses and had the dark hair. They are looking for other grander things...and this feature just a benefit common users get.

Apple to its credit is realizing this, last year iirc they picked up a few acquisitions in the data science realms. thing is this stuff takes time, you can't just buy success in this realm. Tin foil hat is also saying after acquisition internal issues can arise. One acquisition iirc was based heavily in python development. Off the Top of my head a great python product will have issues coming to the apple world. If apple said day 1...great stuff, we liked it so much we bought it. Now lose this python junk and make it proper apple code. Which I'd almost bet on apple has done for some or will any future buys.

Swift, obj c or hell even straight C can and will lack the external library support their work may have used. Why python (and java, perl, others) liked. Vast libraries of modules to pull down. In the data science, informatics and statistics realms especially. You don't have to recode the wheel in its entirety and you focus on your own pieces to the puzzle.
 
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Freakonomics101 said:
Like the title says, what's going on? Usually it hasn't bothered me but lately I've been using Siri more and 99% of the time, it searches the internet and gives me a bunch of links when the Amazon's Echo, or whatever it's called, can do so much more.

I'm truly hoping iOS 11 brings MAJOR improvements and upgrades to Siri. Apple needs to get their game on with this. They need to have that major lead in the industry like they did when Jobs was in charge. Boy, do I miss him.

Edit: Amazon's Alexa, not Echo.
Click to expand...

Completely agree. Siri struggles with dictation and deciphering. And I use Google Voice in comparison, which completely debunks Siri. Siri is great for tasking within the iPhone, but even defining a simple word is a chore. Sometimes Siri is fairly accurate and other times it's so far off base from being accurate.

Last I read on Macrumors, was Siri is under construction by a team of engineers. One of top features in iOS 11, I would really like to see Siri revamped.

And if Apple plans on releasing a home automation product similar to The Echo or Google Home, then rebuilding Siri would be the first step before integrating her into some hardware piece in your home.
 
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bufffilm said:
The OP asks a good question.

What is it about Siri - everything from wrong answers to searching for things which I didn't want - which made me turn it off after about a week of trying it.
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All...the...time. Today, I asked Siri a simple question. What's Michigan's minimum wage? Siri gives me a bunch of links. That's pathetic.
 
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Freakonomics101 said:
Like the title says, what's going on? Usually it hasn't bothered me but lately I've been using Siri more and 99% of the time, it searches the internet and gives me a bunch of links when the Amazon's Echo, or whatever it's called, can do so much more.

I'm truly hoping iOS 11 brings MAJOR improvements and upgrades to Siri. Apple needs to get their game on with this. They need to have that major lead in the industry like they did when Jobs was in charge. Boy, do I miss him.

Edit: Amazon's Alexa, not Echo.
Click to expand...


But if stave Jobs was still here iOS would not be what it is today
 
I have both. There ARE times when Siri gets the answer when Alexa doesn't (no link given). Siri also handles more languages than Alexa if that's important to you.
 
snow755 said:
But if stave Jobs was still here iOS would not be what it is today
Click to expand...

Correct. But it also makes me wonder what it would be like *if* he was still in charge. That's one thing we'll unfortunately never find out. Overall, iOS is great, but it has a lot of potential to be better.
 
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I don't use Siri anymore. I used Google myself and I and friends laugh at what Siri replies to with a simple question and can't answer it, but Google can, pathetic
 
I have to say that I never really got the hype with Alexa. The majority of what I ask it is responded with a variation of "I don't know anything about that."

Siri at least is semi-competent and can answer simple questions with ease.

My Echo has been more or less demoted to voice-activated kitchen timer and alarm clock.
 
Pd1987 said:
I agree. Siri is an insufferable piece of junk. Completely useless for questions like this!
Click to expand...

Well, I just asked Siri about Michigan's minimum wage and it told me about $8.90 US dollars per hour. It also gave a graph for the minimum wage over time.

I asked Alexa the same thing. It said $8.50.

I googled the answer and as of Jan 1 2017 it's $8.90 / hr. It was $8.50/hr in 2016.

http://www.michigan.gov/lara/0,4601,7-154-59886_27909-140972--,00.html

So WTH you guys?
 
My biggest problem with Siri is when I activate it, Siri immediately tells me it can't understand me before I even speak. Drives me nuts. Only happens when I long press the home button. When I just use the hey Siri option it works fine.
 
mrkramer said:
It is because they have tighter privacy controls with Siri than with the competition so that limits what Siri is able to know.
Click to expand...

Bingo. People don't understand that there is no free lunch here. You pay dearly for "convenience" i.e. being data strip mined.
 
Reno Raines said:
My biggest problem with Siri is when I activate it, Siri immediately tells me it can't understand me before I even speak. Drives me nuts. Only happens when I long press the home button. When I just use the hey Siri option it works fine.
Click to expand...
When you press the home button you have to hold it while you speak, and release when done now.
 
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