New iPhone's Siri Shows Real Promise

Bloggers seem to like the voice-recognition feature
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 5, 2011 3:33 PM CDT

Much of the buzz around the iPhone 4S centers on its Siri voice-recognition system that Apple says makes the phone a virtual personal assistant. Some takes today:

  • This could work: What's promising about Siri is that it addresses the long-running problems associated with voice recognition, writes Paul Miller at the This is my next blog. In short, it's better at understanding you and figuring out your commands. "Siri has access to your current location, your to-do list, and your calendar. Since it’s not operating blind, you don’t have to be as 'computer precise' with your instructions." (Miller still has a few caveats, though, in his full post.)

  • Look out, Google: "While Siri isn’t search technology, when paired with other services including Wolfram Alpha, Wikipedia and Yelp, it has the potential to divert significant traffic away from Google and other search engines," writes Ryan Kim at GigaOm.
  • Deja vu: Jason Kottke points to a 1987 Apple video about something called Knowledge Navigator that is much like today's Siri. (See the video in the gallery, along with Apple's Siri demo.)
  • It's called what? The Wall Street Journal notes that Siri sounds like "shiri" in Japanese, which means buttocks. Twitter users there are having a field day with jokes and using the derriere character for it.
In related news, click to read why Samsung wants sales of the iPhone 4S banned in Italy and France. (More Apple stories.)

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