Siri

Apple’s attention to detail extends to ads

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 7, 2012

If you're subscribed to Apple's official YouTube channel and have email notifications for new uploads enabled, an alert may have hit your inbox today saying Apple just uploaded the Siri ad starring film director Martin Scorsese (go here for a parody treatment).

And just like that, because the video has replaced the original clip, a bunch of web pages that have the original embed code in place now show empty boxes (don't worry, I already updated our article with a new code).

At first glance, the commercial is exactly the same as the original ad from two weeks ago. At closer inspection, the new version removes the AT&T branding and fixes a minuscule editing error that only the pickiest of eyes would catch. That's attention to detail for you...

Nuance unveils Nina, the virtual assistant for iOS and Android apps

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated July 12, 2017

Nuance, the voice recognition engine that powers Siri, today announced a new kind of digital personal assistant aimed at mobile customer service apps. Called Nina, she "transforms iPhone and Android mobile apps into powerful engagement tools that allow customers to serve themselves". Nina promises to cover everything from paying your bills to getting answers to your questions to changing or adding service on the fly.

Built on the same voice recognition engine from Nuance that Apple licensed for Siri, Nina can be added to iOS and Android apps via a software development kit (SDK) issued today as part of the announcement. What's best, Nina doesn't require that you tediously type in your password for various services and instead recognizes your voice to provide secure authentication...

Martin Scorsese Siri ad gets the parody treatment

Cody Lee ∙ August 1, 2012

Last week, Apple started airing a new Siri commercial featuring the popular film director Martin Scorsese. The ad was the fourth in a string of celebrity spots focused on the digital assistant.

Unsurprisingly, a parody video has just been made to poke fun at the ad. You've seen "The Samuel L. Jackson ad you were hoping for." Now, here's "Scorsese's alternate iPhone commercial..."

Taiwan university sues Apple over Siri speech recognition

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 30, 2012

A university in Taiwan has sued Apple over its use of dictation feature in Siri and the underlying speech recognition engine, claiming Apple's implementation violates its patents. National Cheng Kung University has on Monday launched a lawsuit against the iPhone maker and is seeking undisclosed damages, though its lawyers noted that any calculation would be based on Apple's U.S. sales of devices that use Siri, quite possibly amounting to millions of dollars in damages...

Siri gets it all wrong in latest iPhone 4S ad

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated November 19, 2018

If you've used Siri in the past, you know how reliable, or how unreliable it can be. For someone like me who speaks with a strong French accent, Siri gets it wrong more often than not, which led me to use Siri for very basic tasks instead of trying to push her limits.

If there is one time where Siri should be right on spot though, it's during commercials or ads. But there again, it seems like Siri, or rather Apple marketing department, isn't on top of its game.

In a recent ad placed on the back cover of the Economist, Siri was asked "what does poison oak look like" and she managed to return the wrong results...

Apple airs new Siri TV ad with Martin Scorsese

Cody Lee ∙ Updated August 7, 2012

Apparently the handful of class-action lawsuits haven't shaken Apple's marketing team. The company has just released a new television ad starring its often-criticized digital assistant.

The fourth in a string of celebrity spots, famed film director Martin Scorsese co-stars with Siri in this new iPhone 4S commercial set in what looks to be a New York City taxi cab...

Siri-like voice assistant turns up in latest BlackBerry 10 alpha update

Cody Lee ∙ July 21, 2012

No matter what your opinion of Siri is, you have to admit that it has really sparked an interest in digital assistants. Voice commands and recognition obviously existed long before the feature, but not like this.

And you don't have to look any further than the competition for proof. Shortly after Apple unveiled its Assistant last fall, other manufacturers started beefing up their voice technology. Samsung, for example, now has its S-Voice, LG has Quick Voice, and there are several others bubbling up...

Is Siri’s magic wearing off?

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 12, 2018

When Apple unveiled Siri last fall, the tech world seemed genuinely excited. Sure, other platforms like Android and Windows Phone already had voice control, but Apple's assistant seemed to be on another level.

Over the next few months, however, that excitement slowly began to wear off. Siri's beta roots started showing with service outages, and a noticeable drop in accuracy. And then the lawsuits started to appear...

New suit from China takes aim at Siri

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 25, 2016

Just as Apple has finally settled its long-standing legal dispute in China over the iPad moniker for a cool $60 million, paving the way for the official tablet launch in the country, a new patent infringement claim has been filed.

This one targets Apple's Siri digital personal assistant. As it would seem, Siri might have taken more than a few clues from an interesting voice-activated technology a local firm patented back in 2006, months before the first iPhone had been unveiled.

This development could potentially be devastating now that Apple is gearing up to launch the iPad in the country because the device will come preloaded with Siri as part of a fall iOS 6 software update...

HiddenHelper allows you to use Siri while hiding the UI

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated February 25, 2013

HiddenHelper is a jailbreak tweak that's the public successor to the GhostSiri concept tweak that we posted about a while back. HiddenHelper, like GhostSiri, aims to accomplish the same deed — allow you to use Siri without actually bringing up the Siri UI.

Where HiddenHelper one-ups GhostSiri is in the options department. In HiddenHelper's settings panel, you'll notice provisions for enabling certain Siri snippets where a UI is necessary to receive proper response; Wolfram Alpha queries are a great example of this.

Check out our full video walkthrough for the details...

Siri’s search accuracy graded as a D, Google text search gets a B+

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated June 13, 2016

Curious to figure out which is more accurate for searching, Apple's Siri or Google's traditional search engine, Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster pitted Siri's voice-activated search against Google's old-fashioned text-based searching. He and his team set out to ask their iPhones a total of 1,600 questions, 800 on the busy streets of Minneapolis, 800 in a quiet room. His findings will no doubt come as a surprise to even the most vocal Siri proponents out there...

Google Now pitted against Siri in voice assistant face-off

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 19, 2019

Google announced a lot of shiny new things yesterday during its mid-morning media event. Among those, was the next version of Android OS with a built-in voice assistant.

The company's Google Now voice commander is the latest in what's becoming a long line of "Siri competitors." But it looks like this one might actually be up to the task...