Tag Archives: Siri

Jan 14 2012

Rumor: Apple to launch iPad 3 in March

We’ve been holding off reporting this, but now it does look like that Apple will be launching the iPad 3 sometime this March.

Various reports say that the company that assembles the iPad 3 (Foxconn) has already begun production on the device to have plenty “on hand” for Apple’s online and retail stores during the launch.

Here’s a brief rundown on what we have heard and read so far:

Rumor has it that the iPad 3 will be slightly thicker then the current model.

Rumors suggest that it will have a higher resolution front and back cameras.

Rumor has it that Siri will be a part of the new device.

Rumor has it that it will have a higher quality retina display.

When the device does go on sale, the current iPad 2 will be lowered around $200.00 while the iPad 3 will be the price of the current one.

 

Dec 31 2011

Google pulls one Siri clone, but leaves another

On Friday, we reported that their was a Siri clone appearing on the Android Market.

Now, it seems that Google has pulled at least one of the clones, but is keeping others available.

We’ll continue to follow this and issue updates when we know more.

Dec 30 2011

Fake Siri App hits Android market

Late Thursday, we discovered a pair of Android applications claiming to be “the answer to Siri for Android” and even sport Apple’s Siri logo (as shown on the right).

According to the description:

Siri, now for your Android device!

This application is a Siri icon that opens “Google’s Voice Actions” app.

Google Voice Actions is a powerful app that comes with every Android device. It supports many different voice commands and Google is constantly working to make it even more powerful. Show your iPhone friends your Android phone can do what Siri does!
Some Example Commands include:

Send text messages
Say “send text to [recipient] [message]*”
e.g. “send text to Allison Miller Running late. I will be home around 9″

Nov 21 2011

Apple TV and its remote control – it sucks!

By: Dan Uff

Don’t get me wrong by the title, I love Apple TV and have had one since Apple first introduced it.  I stream my music, movies, photos, and other content to my HDTV all the time.

The set up for a newer TV is a snap, and one can get the device up and running in no time.  All of that statement would be true except for one annoying thing….The Apple TV’s remote control.

Who ever came up with the design for this thing (even if it was Steve Jobs) was on something.  The last thing that I want is to heck and peck on an onscreen keyboard with a remote control’s arrow buttons.  If you have ever used the remote in this way, you know what I mean.

Fortunately, Apple has made an application for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad to make our lives easier.  While it won’t help you with the initial setup, it will make your life easier later on.

The set up for the app is quick and easy (hell, even my cat could do it!)

The app lets you control the Apple TV by swiping motions on an iOS device.  When you have to enter something, a real keyboard comes up on the device.

For more information, click here (opens iTunes).

BrainWaves
Nov 15 2011

“Mind Control Siri Hack” is FAKE!

A few days ago, we posted a video showing someone controlling Siri with their mind (or so we thought).

Greg Courville, an undergraduate physics student at the University of California, explains why it is a fake:

“If you haven’t spotted it already: not only does there appear to be virtually nothing connected to the SpeakJet chip, it’s also placed sideways in the breadboard, which shorts a number of critical pins together, and therefore would make it impossible to use.

The project’s blog claims that ”ECG pads provide raw skin conductivity / electrical activity as analogue data (0-5v)”. Let’s go ahead and ignore the fact that they seem to have confused EEG with ECG (which is a completely different type of measurement), and the spurious reference to “skin conductivity” (ditto). The most glaring problem with that statement is the claim that EEG signals fall in an Arduino-friendly 0-5V positive voltage range. Suffice it to say they don’t.

What did Project Black Mirror do? Based on their written statements, their YouTube videos and the photo shown below, they connected the electrode leads directly to the analog input terminals on the Arduino.

In short, there’s not even the slightest chance that they are actually recording EEG signals this way.”

Nov 11 2011

iCloud experiencing hiccups for some users

Apple is reporting inaccessible iCloud services for some users after previous issues that similarly affected some users over the last two days.

Apple’s iCloud system status page reported an outage occurring within the last half hour, an issue at least one reader also noted. AppleInsider was unable to experience any issues with iCloud services, but the company reports that the issues only affect “some” users.

Yesterday, Apple reported issues connecting to mail and notes, a problem it similarly said affected “some” users without providing a metric for how widespread the issue actually was. According to its status report, the issues were resolved in an hour and half.

Earlier in the week, Apple reported account issues that affected “less than 3 percent” of users, but prevented them from logging in or changing passwords.

Apple has also been experiencing some downtime issues with its cloud-based Siri voice assistance service for iPhone 4S, although those problems are not tracked or reported on the iCloud system status page.

The company has worked hard to turn around the negative perception of its MobileMe services, which were introduced into a storm of problems at the release of iOS 3.0 just over two years ago, in part by renaming and streamlining the cloud services under the new name “iCloud.”

Via: AppleInsider.com

 

Nov 9 2011

Rumor: Amazon buys Siri’s speech rival, Yap

Amazon may be quietly if unintentionally gunning after Apple’s Siri with future Kindles, a newly discovered SEC filing (PDF) has revealed. Using a shell company known as Dion Acquisition Sub to keep the deal out of its usual SEC filings, Amazon has bought Yap, which had a voicemail-to-text service but had also focused heavily on natural-language speech recognition and an emphasis on mobile technology. Although terms of the deal were kept secret, the takeover left little question as to Amazon’s involvement, since Dion’s headquarters was at 410 Terry Avenue in Seattle, owned solely by Amazon.

Via: MacNN.com

Nov 9 2011

Apple: “No plans to add Siri on old devices.”

Despite rumors that Apple was testing its voice-activated search and task managing feature Siri to make it available for the iPhone 4, a user who filed a “bug report” suggesting that Apple offer Siri on older iOS devices for a fee got a reply back from the company stating that “we currently have no plans to support older devices,” reports Cult of Mac contributor Michael Steeber.

Via: MacNN.com / Cult of Mac.com / MacRumors.com