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Comment by paxys | Hacker News Reader

Meanwhile I am still waiting for Siri to reach the capability of an average voice assistant from ~2014.

Apple's famously-squandered first-mover advantage with Siri is so entrenched at this point, it feels (at least to an outside observer) like it must simply be culturally and organizationally impossible for Apple to innovate in that space.

I’d love to be surprised at WWDC this year, but it intuitively seems exceedingly unlikely.

The original Siri was more capable than it is now, which blows my mind.

Apparently there's a senior exec in Apple that is even more of a puritan than the "AI safety" nuts and forced Siri to be dumbed down to prevent even the slightest risk of any impropriety.

With people like that in charge, innovation can't occur.

I hate when I make these posts when I know something, and have to eat down votes for it. Believe what you will, but it's not true, not even close to true, or in the same ballpark as truth, and it's not some contentious half truth.

It's a bizarre wholly new rumor that should strike everyone reasonably acquainted with AI as trivially wrong, given timelines.

14 years here, I at least had come to expect common courtesy on what is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

Evidence: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/siri-getting-dumber-wol...

Siri could answer questions it no longer can.

When I ask it to play a specific song in the car, it plays a song at random. This has been a known issue for 3+ years: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253216090?sortBy=best

Literally the only two things I can successfully use it for is setting timers and reminders. Nothing else works robustly.

You say you've worked in the Siri team for 14 years?

Print this out, roll it up, and bop your managers on the nose with it:

YOU'RE MISSING THE BOAT.

You haven't bought a ticket, and you're not even at the pier!

While you guys are still "thinking" about generative AI integration, millions of your users like me have switched to using the Open AI app because it actually understands what I'm saying and can answer usefully.

Just the voice recognition part of Siri alone is being absolutely blown out of the water by demos thrown together by individuals, not entire teams of people working at what is soon to be the former biggest company in the world: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfvLIEHwiyo

If I get a message from my Mum that's not in English, Siri used to say some hilarious verbatim English pronunciation of the words. Total gibberish.

The big improvement now is that she'll just say: "A message in a foreign language" or something to that effect. Simply refusing to do anything useful. The Open AI app can read the same text out loud to me, no problems.

How is that "improving over time"!? What are you guys doing over there? All I see is regressions.

PS: It seems that there aren't even that many people in the Siri team: https://9to5mac.com/2019/01/03/apple-siri-amazon-alexa-hirin...

PPS: Zuckerberg bought 350,000 NVIDIA H100 accelerators. https://www.pcmag.com/news/zuckerbergs-meta-is-spending-bill...

Does the Siri team even have access to a single H100 card? A few dozen maybe? I haven't heard a peep about Apple buying anything from NVIDIA in the last year...

Siri's bad, that's not the same thing as the claim (there's an Apple executive who is so worried about AI becoming super intelligent that they hold it back)

I am not sure that was the intended reference; we know this behaviour now very well from neutering AIs, but I read the statement of gp as, like some of the AI neutering, but even more extreme, this Siri manager is trying to not offend anyone to such extreme that it makes a basically worthless product. Not to save the world from AI. I hope someone, in my lifetime, will make on-device LLMs which allow that type of neutering to be switched off. I don’t get offended and LLMs are getting far worse by trying to ‘protect the children’, not humanity.

That's a fairly accurate summary of position.

Apple doesn't have the right kind of "vision" for what they could achieve with Siri, and they don't have the stomach for the type of risk-taking that it would take to get there even if they did.

If they did, we'd be hearing about Apple buying hundreds of thousands of GPUs, not Facebook.

Yes we are, and yes you are. It's right in the post.

"Apparently there's a senior exec in Apple that is even more of a puritan than the "AI safety" nuts and forced Siri to be dumbed down to prevent even the slightest risk of any impropriety.

With people like that in charge, innovation can't occur."

"slightest risk of any impropriety" isn't "super intelligent"

And it seemed to be a facetious comments. It's how "apparently" is used in colloquial speech nowadays.

The forum post you linked doesn't even demonstrate what you claim, since users just a few posts in were showing Siri giving the correct answers. Testing just now, Siri still gives the correct answers.

I think it was actually demonstrating a different problem: Siri's inconsistency of answers. Sometimes you will ask Siri a thing, and it will get it right. Other times, the exact same query will give something totally different (and totally wrong).

Anecdotally, I've encountered this issue less and less over the year. IMO the public has a brain worm regarding Siri's badness that doesn't really match reality. I'm guilty of the same thing—and yet I constantly see people using Siri for things I would have bet money it couldn't do, successfully. Just recently I asked it a followup question, and it worked perfectly. I didn't think Siri could do that. I was stuck in ChatGPT mentality, or I wouldn't have even tried.

I am not claiming Siri is perfect. I am not claiming it's as good as anyone else (largely because I haven't tried the other voice assistants in a long time). I'm not even saying it's particularly good, let alone "good enough". Apple has dropped the ball, no question.

However, I am saying it's better than online sentiment would have you believe.

Alternatively phrased: Despite it potentially being a competitive disadvantage, Apple still prioritizes user safety and privacy.

It's not just a competitive disadvantage. It's a disadvantage to the user too because Siri works so poorly.

I have consistently found Siri works better than Alexa for what I use a voice assistant for. Google assistant beats them both though.

At this point I feel like I rarely have any Siri issues and use it all the time so I am confused when people mention how bad it is.

I think a lot of it has to do with constant changes that suddenly break phrases people are used to using.

For a personal example, I had a six-month period where Siri stopped understanding the word 'half' (as in, 'Hey Siri, volume to half'), and either ignored or misinterpreted any command that included it.

Never had that experience.

What? Siri catches what I say correctly probably less than 50% of the time. Nevermind its ability to actually do useful things. You ask it for trivia, it returns a “here’s what I found on the web” response. Google gives me the answer.

Google is superior, especially with knowledge questions but when it comes to things like sending text messages, controlling smart home devices, starting timers, setting reminders, Siri is almost flawless for me.

That’s been my experience as well.

And for controlling smart home devices Google is wildly inconsistent, and near constantly glitching.

This is the only thing I want it to do (through home assistant) and it doesn't do it well at all :(

There was a period of time where siri bitflipped statements about %40 of the time for me. "Turn lights off" became on, "turn lights on" became off. And it understands my partner far less, despite both of us being native speakers.

What I have always found strange about Siri is how radically different the experience appears to be for each person. I know plenty of people where it works great but then you have tons that say it is shit. I have never seen a good explanation as it seems like Alexa and google assistant is fairly consistent person to person as compared to Siri.

It only ever understands me if I adopt an American accent; and that not consistently, presumably because it's bad (and often comically exaggerated). But my actual (British) voice never as far as I can recall.

So maybe the varied experience is largely just whether you're American and if so have the right regional accent? (For what it's worth, my go-to impression is I think what you'd call 'valley girl', or whatever the male equivalent is. Since I feel liiike that's basically what all city-dwelling Americans sound like to me anywaaay. Do they sound that way to you allso orrr no? ;) )

I regularly have this, daily, and as recently as this morning.

I use it mainly as a frontend for Home Assistant. Alexa worked way better but it's not as good for privacy (to put it mildly...)

I really really would love to see some LLM love in these services rather than all this scripted 2010s stuff.

Do you use any Apple Home / HomeKit automations? She is very frustrating and verbose. And constantly starts playing U2 on my HomePods even though I swear that I have deleted that album four different ways.

A year or so ago I was dealing with a mouse problem in my house. How this often manifested was a mouse running over one of my HomePods during the night, which would trigger Songs of Innocence to play and wake my partner and I up. I’ve never hated U2 so much in my life.

Yes yes yes this so much.

I sooo wish i could delete that *** album because every time it gets me wrong it starts playing it. And I don't even like U2. If I didn't have that it would have nothing to play because my music library would be empty.

There seems to be no way to do it...

I'm amazed to see multiple posters in this thread still getting Bono-rolled by Apple products a decade later. I moved it to my “hidden purchases“ almost as many years ago and it has never resurfaced; has Apple changed something since then?

I have used HomeKit for a VERY long time now and I can't remember the last time Siri had an issue controlling devices. It works 99% of the time and the 1% of the time it doesn't work is a rather specific part of the house where my watch has connectivity issues so Siri hangs.

Some of us value privacy far more than a functional voice assistant. It’s why I have an iPhone rather than Android.

The juxtaposition between your username and your comment is likely lost to you.

Some realize one should not give up essential private data for small, temporary conveniences. This point is lost on those whose livelihood depends on convincing the public otherwise.

Privacy is one of the reasons I use an Android phone. I don't want Apple to know my location every time I read the GPS. I don't want Apple to know every app I install on my device. I don't want to give Apple my billing details just to make my own apps.

Whether you want more privacy or more functionality, the solution is the same. Use the device that you can control.

Presumably you are using a de-googled Android phone then?

For most people, the choice is between giving that data to Apple or giving it to Google. Personally I am more worried about an advertising company leaking/misusing my data than a hardware company that has made privacy a differentiator in their branding. Not saying I trust that but you have to weigh up your risk factors

Apple is also an advertising company.

https://searchads.apple.com/

Google is also a hardware company

Go look at the respective 10Ks and then get back to us on where each companies makes their money. Google apologists are an incredible bunch.

Why do you think Apple is allowed in China.

You think Apple cares about your privacy? It's part of their PR, sure.

"Privacy" is not illegal in China. China has privacy regulations the US doesn't. Even if law enforcement can see absolutely everything (which they can't) the state still isn't interested in letting random other private parties see everything about you.

You’re moving the goalposts. Privacy from the data harvesting private sector, and privacy from the State, are different propositions. We see clearly talking about the former, and Apple has a….fairly good, but imperfect track record with the latter.

Interesting, since Google ( as far as I know) doesn't share any of it's data it has to other parties in the private sector either.

Suggesting Google has a bad reputation with sharing data to private companies isn't going to be enough. I'd like to see some proof to back that up...

No. A Googled Android phone lets you choose which Google services you want to choose. It doesn't send any of the data to Google I mentioned earlier that an iPhone sends to Apple, so there isn't even a chance to misuse it.

Really? Google doesn’t know your GPS location or what apps you’ve installed? How does Maps and the Play Store work then?

Apple knows your location if any app uses the GPS.

On Android, even Google Android, you're free to use fully on-device maps that don't send your location to anyone, or you could use competing apps that don't send your location to Google. Similarly, you can install apps from an APK from anywhere without telling Google or anybody else that you've installed them, even on Google Android.

User control means privacy, not just better features.

So, de-googled then. You're using a different App Store/sideloading and disabling a load of the functionality in Google Maps (GPS is kind of useful for navigation)

As I said, this isn't an option for most people.

Not de-Googled. Running a stock Google build.

GPS doesn't require Google. It just reads radio signals. Only Apple requires sending the result of analyzing those GPS signals back to Apple, even if you just want to use it to find your location on a map stored locally. Apple doesn't give you any options for privacy.

Assisted GPS is something literally every phone does, from every manufacturer. Without help from an external service, it would take up to half an hour to acquire a fix using GPS radio signals alone.

I have a friend just like you, who looks at something perfectly innocent that Apple does, screams “spyiiiiiing!” and runs into the arms of Google — a company famous for turning people into data products. That’s literally all they do. They don’t even know how to do anything else to make money.

Apple is a hardware company first and foremost that treats their users as customers, which is distasteful to you for some reason.

PS: Apple phones can acquire a GPS lock without cellular connectivity. I’ve relied on this feature many times in the Australian outback.

Oh, and you can turn Find My feature off if you’re that paranoid.

> Assisted GPS is something literally every phone does, from every manufacturer.

The difference between every other manufacturer and Apple is that every other manufacturer lets you turn it off if you care about privacy.

> Without help from an external service, it would take up to half an hour to acquire a fix using GPS radio signals alone

Up to. If you're under a rock and haven't previously gotten a location.

> Apple is a hardware company first and foremost

Apple is a marketing company first and foremost. Why give users control, the only way to actual privacy, when not giving them control lets you make more money off of them and marketing privacy will fool people into believing you offer actual privacy?

> PS: Apple phones can acquire a GPS lock without cellular connectivity. I’ve relied on this feature many times in the Australian outback.

And yet despite this, your iPhone will send your location back to Apple, including where you were while you were offline, as soon as it gets network connectivity.

> Oh, and you can turn Find My feature off if you’re that paranoid.

That doesn't stop Apple from getting your location.

You seem to believe I'm a Google apologist. You're wrong. I've criticized Google plenty on this forum. I'm a Firefox-using user control apologist.

When trying to offend nobody, one winds up offending everybody.

TBH, if they give us first class support for hardware optimized local LLMs and other "AI", I'll forgive them.

Aye! What a flash in the pan that was! I remember being at SXSW in 2010 and people showing off this cool assistant app. A month later, Apple acquired it and then crickets.

When it was finally integrated into iOS, it could just barely set timers. What a waste of an amazing team.

I found this on the web for you

Yet I expect that Siri is still the most widely used voice assistant just because people don’t really use many complicated commands or queries.

People I know just create appointments, do hands free calling and simple stuff that Siri is pretty good at.

I think you should prepare to be surprised.

Why do you say that, distant relative?

The Apple Maps 1.0 release was a complete shitshow but it has quietly gotten better than Google Maps by this point. But the average google maps user is still mentally living back in 2012 and still thinks that Apple Maps sucks as hard as it did at launch. Apple does improve its products over time. In this case though due to the problems with AI and everything from racist Tay bot to "DEI" google gemini issues they're going to be taking their time to avoid another Apple Maps launch. Institutionally they've learned from the Apple Maps launch and they aren't going to show you a half-baked product any more. If you misinterpret the lack of any visible progress to the consumer as lack of any progress you probably don't have a good mental model of how Apple operates. They also aren't likely to be dumb enough to just not even bother on working to improve their AI assistant with the last decade worth of improvements in DNNs/LLMs. And the "first mover advantage" usually isn't an actual advantage and its better to be second or third and copy what works and put a lot of polish on it. Siri itself is kind of proof of that (Friendster and MySpace are two other examples--there's lots of past HN topics on this). They don't need to leap into the LLM voice assistant space half baked in order to try to get ahead of everyone else--that is startup-which-will-eventually-get-bought/HN kind of logic, not actual market leadership logic.

Nah Apple maps still sucks where I live. Lots of small streets and alleys that are on Google maps are absent on Apple's. Locations are slow to be updated. Driving directions that are illogical to locals. Maybe it's better in Cupertino/New York, but not where I live.

Apple Maps works fine all over the midwest for me using it in offline mode.

What do you use your voice assistant for? I use Siri to set timers, set alarms, create reminders, identify songs (which uses Shazam), and turn on/off various smart devices around the house.

I use Siri a lot when driving. It's completely hit or miss if it will provide me with an answer or tell me to open my phone to view web results.

Some of it's rather baffling. Like being able to convert certain common units but not others.

The problem I have is that the quality of dictation seems to drop precipitously when using something other than the microphone built into an iPhone. In my car, Siri and dictation feel like a bad tech demo; as soon as I disable Bluetooth, accuracy shoots back up again. (And I know for a fact that the hands-free in my car makes super clear phone calls.)

I use it mostly while driving to request specific songs. It is insane that in multiple cases, it has shown the song I asked for on the lock screen, changing from the previous track so I know it understood what I asked it for, and then plays something entirely random that I have never heard before and is not in my library. I don't know how that even happens, but it has happened multiple times. Siri is truly awful and they certainly don't need an LLM to make Siri functional but anything that drives it forward is welcome relief.

Specific example of Siri seemingly recognizing exactly what I said, but playing something totally different. (In this case it is another song from my library, but I'm not usually in a position to take a screenshot or record the screen when I'm driving.) https://i.imgur.com/t9dnoTx.png

Are you connected to the car radio? I wonder if it's fighting the phone when it tries to change tracks.

Nah, just hooked up via aux. It isn't specific to me being in the car, that is just where I mostly need to use hands-free.

You often convert units while driving?

What would be an example of unit conversion you need to get done while en route?

Liters to gallons, just from the tiptop of my head?

It was a representative example of a task type that randomly succeeds or fails without much reason.

Here’s an actual example I did last week: “how much does a gallon of gas weigh?” Response: open your phone to search the web. I just tried it again tonight and it gave the answer directly.

Siri excels at setting a hot dog done timer with my voice. That’s good, right?

And you want it to do what? Fill out your taxes? This is a one-trick pony by design. :-)

Tell me your secrets. I’ll practice it in your voice, your language, whatever.

I get a time about half the time, and then if I immediately ask how much left on the timer, Siri informs me there are no timers. Which then promptly goes off.

I set timers for 49 minutes frequently because Siri will hear 15 instead of 50

Reminds me of hitting 99 seconds on the microwave because it’s easier to enter than 1 minute 30.

One of the more obnoxious "features " of English.

We should have big numbers like the French do. "60-10" (70) or "4-20" (80)

Twenty fingers 'n toes. It stands to reason eh.

Fourscore and seven years ago, we did.

Ironically when I want a 15 minute timer, I get given 50 a lot of the time... 14 and 40 are also problematic.

I figure I am just holding it wrong.

You can get around this by asking Siri for a timer for "one five" minutes and "five zero" minutes.

(Folks irl do this too... damn you english language...)

Reminds me that emergency services are adamant about not calling it (as in the song):

    So they called nine-eleven, like any piggy would
    The sent out Rambo, just as fast, as they could

Because in a stressful situation, people would literally get hung up looking for the "11" key on the phone.

how long do you set your hot dog done timer for? do you cook it until plump? usually my dogs split, probably with too high temperature?

Yeah, back in 2011, I bought iPhone 4S, not 4, for exactly that, because of Siri. Expecting it to work as I imagined back then. Siri is still not there, 13 years / generations of iPhones later.

or 2000 https://www.fastcompany.com/90209550/general-magics-forgotte...

It says uh-huh and um-hmm. That should compensate for everything else I suppose.

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