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Google Unveils New Search Features, Including iOS Voice Search
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."
What is this made-up crap about Congress in the summary? Do the editors bother reviewing submissions? (Of course not, this is Slashdot!)
Voice search has been on Android for about three years now.
Just because IOS users are finally getting it does not make it news.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Apple ought to have been prosecuted for its anti-competitive practices a long time ago. I have no idea why this hasn't happened.
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?
Coincidentally (perhaps), "Siri" was the name of a gay starship captain in "The forever War".
Not true. It's done much more than simple text entry for a long time, and it got a major upgrade in Jelly Bean. Reviews are now generally calling it superior to Siri.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
You don't have to be a monopoly to be prosecuted. Microsoft certainly wasn't a monopoly on the desktop when it was prosecuted. Or Standard Oil when it was prosecuted. You only have to have a large enough share of a certain market that your presence is "anti-competitive" and blocks other companies from succeeding. Apple certainly fits that description in the cellphone & tablet markets.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
The monopoly "requirement" only applies to Section 2 violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
Section 1 "anti-competitive" violations have no such requirement.
Regardless of what Google may have said about its "biggest threat", search engines are the backbone of many other interesting services anyway. Nowadays it's how we get everywhere. Most of the time I barely bother with bookmarks: if I want to find a locksmith in West Fooville, I might google "locksmith in west fooville kentucky" or I might speak it into a phone, but it's the search engine that's doing the heavy lifting. I suspect that the targeted ads in gmail are built on top of their search engine in some fashion, and not just a natural language understanding engine (anybody out there know for certain?).
By the way, if you want a Google [and Amazon] insider's perspective on services and platforms, you must check out Steve Yegge's classic rant on the topic: http://steverant.pen.io/
Koans and fables for the software engineer
Troll? No, the word you're looking for is 'informative'. It's a classic work of science fiction, and I could definitely see naming a product after a character in it, especially if it's an 'in joke'.
The court declared MS to be a monopoly so who should've believe? You or the court?
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
A monopoly doesn't need to control 100% of the market. It just needs to have monopoly power by controlling a large chunk of the market and being able to direct the market at will.
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?
#DeleteChrome
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 vastly superior 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).
microsoft controlled 90% of the operating system market when the antitrust suit was filed in 1998
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ofnote/9-16mrktshare.mspx
Countries define what percentage qualifies as a monopoly. In the UK, a company is defined as having monopoly power when it passes 25% market share.
http://economicsonline.co.uk/Market_failures/Monopoly_power.html
In the US, 100% has never been required to qualify as a monopoly. Standard Oil controlled 91% of production, and 85% of US sales four years before the antitrust suit was filed.
Section 2 of the sherman antitrust act:
Every person who shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty of a felony
And to be prosecuted under that section, two things have to be proven:
(1) the possession of monopoly power in the relevant market and
(2) the willful acquisition or maintenance of that power as distinguished from growth or development as a consequence of a superior product, business acumen, or historic accident.
#2 is called the rule of reason - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_reason
Siri is basically Wolfram Alpha, so yes.
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.
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.
Can't speak for Google Voice Search on Android, but...
Awhile ago, we were making a McDonald's run and I asked Jennifer what she wanted. She told me to pick her up a 6-piece McNuggets with Barbecue sauce. I pulled out my iPhone and wrote myself a note in the notepad: Jennifer's order is a 6-piece McNuggets with Barbecue sauce. I then brought up Siri and said, "Siri, what is Jennifer's order?" Siri thought for a moment and said, "I don't know. Would you like me to search the web for Jennifer's order?"
What's funny is that when I went to the iOS Search Screen, turned on the microphone, and said, "Jennifer's order," the first thing to pop up was the note that I had written.
So, no, Siri only integrates with some of Apple's apps.
It seems Google Voice Search in Jelly Bean works a little better. Asking for sunset gives me the correct answer. Asking for sunrise this morning gives me sunrise for tomorrow. Asking for sunrise or sunset in Cleveland, Ohio works fine, but asking about a specific date brings up a Google search result which does have links to accurate information.
So you didnt read the part in the summary where it said "already available in Jelly Bean, but also available via downloadable app" Anyway why would google want to provide an incentive to upgrade to a new phone? They don't even make phones and they give the OS away for free. It is actually in their best interest to have this new function available as widely as possible since they make their money through advertising.
Having a monopoly is perfectly legal. In some cases, it's a very practical move (natural monopolies, when properly regulated), in others, it just falls out because of the nature of the market (some software sold is so specialized, only one company really makes it because the market consists of 10-odd entities, say).
That's perfectly allowable by all the laws.
What's not allowable is when you use that monopoly to basically barge your way into another market (e.g. Microsoft Windows barging into the browser world by including IE).
Apple nearly fell into anti-trust with the iPod and iTunes Store - because they practically used the iPod and iTunes to lock people in. It would be a very fine line (because iPod+iTunes complemented each other, and iPod grew in dominance due to timing alongside iTunes first-mover advantage). The iPhone? Not so much - Android is a bigger seller and has more marketshrae. The iPad? Perhaps, though it's marketshare is dropping (it's down to sub-70%), and was really first-mover advantage compounded by well, crappy competitors with rushed products. Though, it's unclear where Apple is muscling in.
Heck, Google has to be careful - they own practically all the advertising networks out there (making them both the supplier of "good ads" like AdSense, and the purveyor of annoying ones like popunders courtesy DoubleClick, a Google-owned subsidiary).