Apple's Siri As Revolutionary As the Mac? 692
hype7 writes "The Harvard Business Review is running an article on Siri, the speech recognition technology inside the new iPhone. They make the case that Siri's use of artificial intelligence and speech recognition is going to change the way we interact with machines. From the article: 'The advantage of using speech over other interaction paradigms is that we have honed its use over thousands of years. It is entirely natural for us to talk to one another. Talking is one of the first things we learn how to do as children. It's second nature for us to ask a colleague or a friend a question and for them to answer the same way. Being able to talk to a phone like it's a personal assistant is something that people are going to get very used to, very quickly. It's a much more natural approach than using a mouse on a desktop. And I highly doubt the impact is going to stop at phones.'"
Re:Purely out of curiosity (Score:4, Interesting)
PCs have had it for ages too, I tried it 10 years ago... Felt like a dork (and that was all on my lonesome in my room, not in a crowded street), was slower than typing (on a keyboard though, not a touchscreen), and misunderstood me enough to make it a pain.
It's indeed also on my Android phone, never cared until Siri, tried it out when it seemed to be the next magical thing... dropped it as fast as the first time around.
From what I've read, Siri might be more accurate and more intelligent, but my guess is, not enough to override the basic dorkiness and inaccuracy of a speech interface.
Re:Except not? (Score:5, Interesting)
Perhaps, but isn't that the point?
Every so often someone comes along trying to reinvent the wheel on computer interfaces, and it usually falls flat - like the "arms up in the air Minority Report UI", or 3D UIs etc.
Taking a bunch of features that people use all the time and combining it into a system that you can interact with quickly and easily when you're not "actively using" your device might be exactly what we need.
Being able to pick up your phone and say "remind me to call mom when I get home" and then put it right back down and have the phone be able to work out what you want is a great idea. It takes you about 5 seconds and then you can go back to whatever you were doing.
I don't think we'll be using it like Star Trek just yet as the main way we interact with computers, but for simple things like that I think it could be awesome (dare I say, "magical (TM)").
As many people will point out here, this is not Apple's original technology, they weren't the first to do it, there will be use cases where it won't work, you can do it much more cheaply and non-walled-garden-y with a rooted Nexus GTi Turbo running cyanogen, Apple steals everything, they're an evil empire tracking your every move and other such tiresome memes etc etc, but Siri is one of the first attempts to really pull this sort of thing together cohesively. Whether it is successful or not, who can say yet? It's certainly interesting and I expect we'll see it on many other smartphones in a similar guise - it's not like the technology is unique.
Re:Bah (Score:5, Interesting)
A good touch typer can accurately do 60 wpm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touch_typing). I've seen ones that can come close to 100 wpm with relatively few errors, at least in short bursts.
Typical speech rates are 140-200 wpm, depending on the subject and the speakers mood (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005018.html). Pretty much everyone can speak and comprehend 300 wpm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute), and some people can speak as high has 500 wpm. You can read around 300 wpm.
I suspect the reality is you type at somewhere between 25-50% of the speed you can talk, and that's for ordinary words. Throw in special characters that require you to do complex keystrokes and your typing will tank, but your speech will not. For instance, check your words per minute typing something like this vrs reading it (assuming you have a standard US keyboard).
Please tell Mr Muños that it is £200 or ¥20,000; and Mr Schröder would like a response immediately.
I bet you can say that as fast as any other sentence, but typing it will require you to look up a character or two unless you type international stuff a lot.
Re:Purely out of curiosity (Score:5, Interesting)
The real issue with it is how much of a dork you look like talking to your phone.
Once upon a time, before they became internet terminals, everybody talked into their phone. I hadn't realised it had become so rare!
You don't have to press the home button and talk into it like a walkie-talkie you know. The proximity sensor will switch Siri on if you put the iPhone to the side of your head, if you're not making a phone call. And you can also operate it via the handsfree kit.
Ben there done that (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Purely out of curiosity (Score:5, Interesting)
Even better, if you press and hold the search button, it'll automatically start voice actions. I don't think I've sent but five typed text messages since I started using it.
Re:Purely out of curiosity (Score:5, Interesting)
I had computer graphics on my computer back in 1982. So these modern day "consoles" can't be anything special, eh?
Every product with speech recognition is not the same, just as every product with graphics is not the same.
And whilst people might feel dorks talking to a desktop, they're very used to holding a phone up to the side of their face and speaking into it. It's not seemed like a bizarre occupation for many decades.
Wildfire did that. (Score:4, Interesting)
Listen to this Wildfire demo [virtuosity.com]. 1990s technology. Used by Orange Mobile. Used a lot of compute power for the 1990s. Cost about $5/day originally; became cheaper by 2005 or so. Bought by Microsoft. Run into the ground. Sold off to a small company, Virtuosity. Still available.
Way ahead of its time.
Re:MIght as well be (Score:3, Interesting)
are you kidding?!?
Mac computers are the closest thing to Linux you're going to get off the shelf.
If you're really smart, you want as little friction between you and doing what you want as possible. get a Imac with a 27" screen, shipped to your door and working out of the box.
That said, I hate the OSX UI, but if you're really looking for a powerful command line out of the box, OSx is the way to go.
Re:MIght as well be (Score:5, Interesting)
"Losing ground" = higher sales year-over-year?
Why not? RIM has been growing year-over-year, though if you listen to the tech-press and slashdot commenters you'd think they were on the verge of bankruptcy.
Re:Purely out of curiosity (Score:4, Interesting)
I asked Voice Actions [android.com], "Who would win - Superman or Batman?". It answered (out loud), "Superman, because he has super strength, and Batman only has fancy gadgets and hand-to-hand combat."
Its thoughts on pirates vs ninjas were also enlightening and extensive. And it'll even read you a poem, if you ask for one.