Google Unveils New Search Features, Including iOS Voice Search 96
First time accepted submitter sohmc writes "Some time ago, Google admitted that the biggest threat was not other search engines but services like Siri. However, Google just bridged that gap with Google Voice Search, already available in Jelly Bean, but also available via downloadable app. Google also submitted this app to the iOS App Store and is currently waiting approval. However, Slashdotters are no doubt recalling to mind the 'Google Voice' fiasco, in which Apple refused to allow it to appear, saying that it replaces a native function. It wasn't until Apple was brought before Congress to answer questions on how it approves or rejects apps that Google Voice was brought in."
not equivalent (Score:1, Interesting)
Google voice search is just an alternative entry method for the standard search. It is hardly a strategic counter to the more AI-driven approach (ok, quasi-AI) that Siri represents. And it does little to address either the vertical search gap presented by Yelp, or the "diagonal" functionality gap that Siri addresses by smoothly integrating with your other iOS apps like text message, alarm or calendar.
Anti-competitve practices (Score:5, Interesting)
For God's sake, Microsoft is forced to include a nag screen advertising other browsers (including the ones virtually nobody uses) while Apple gets a free pass to prevent others browsers from even functioning properly on iOS, censors its competitors and dissidents in its app store, and makes use of vendor lock-in wherever it can.
Why the double standard?
Re:Nothing new here (Score:2, Interesting)
Voice search has been on Android for about three years now.
Just because IOS users are finally getting it does not make it news.
Finally getting it? I've had an iPhone 4 since release, and I'm pretty damn sure the Google App has both Voice and Picture search.
How is this different?
Apparently I'm in the minority (Score:5, Interesting)
I really don't like these new voice features. Having to hear the incessant blathering from some cell phone users is bad enough - now I have to hear them talking at their phones when they're not on a call?
Re:not equivalent (Score:5, Interesting)
Google voice search is just an alternative entry method for the standard search. It is hardly a strategic counter to the more AI-driven approach (ok, quasi-AI) that Siri represents.
Are you kidding me? It's not even a contest. Comparing Google Voice Search to Siri is just like comparing Google Search to Yahoo Search (the Yahoo Search of 10 years ago). Even Steve Wozniak says that Google voice search is [mashable.com] vastly superior [businessinsider.com] to Siri (even long before Gingerbread came out, he was saying stuff like that, now Google voice search can be used offline in addition to what it can already do online, and in that time, Siri has only been getting worse with even more commercial answers to non-commercially based queries).
Also, the idea of launching specific intents/actions on a phone instead of launching just a web page is an idea that Google pioneered long ago, that Apple just recently imitated.
And it does little to address either the vertical search gap presented by Yelp, or the "diagonal" functionality gap that Siri addresses by smoothly integrating with your other iOS apps like text message, alarm or calendar.
But Google Voice Search does also search through the internal content/actions of your phone at the same time as the Internet. It did that for a while now (that's why I can't comprehend how Apple even got a patent on a similar idea).
Re:google now (Score:2, Interesting)
Siri is basically Wolfram Alpha, so yes.
Re:google now (Score:5, Interesting)
Not always. This one surprised me...
A few months back, I biked in to work. I was bit a concerned about riding home in the dark and wanted to see the sunset time. On a lark, I asked Siri, "Siri, what time is sunset?" Siri thought for a moment and came back and said, "Sunset is at 7:34PM."
Wow! I was impressed. Siri also showed me the weather for the rest of the week!
So I figured I'd try something else. "Siri, what time was sunrise?" Siri thought for a moment and came back and said, "I'm sorry, I can't tell you the weather from the past."
Huh? I'm asking about sunrise and sunset. Not weather.
I noticed that this has since been fixed--Siri will tell me sunrise and sunset times for anywhere in the country. But I can't say, "Siri, what time will the sun rise in Cleveland, Ohio, on December 23rd, 2012?" because Siri is getting sunrise and sunset information from the same place it gets weather information (which seems to be why it shows a weather forecast along side). But if I pose the same question to Wolfram-Alpha, it replies correctly.