"Like the author, I consider Siri (and most other vocal assistants that I’ve never used, but am just prejudiced against) to be garbage: unworkable, and a flawed

"Like the author, I consider Siri (and most other vocal assistants that I’ve never used, but am just prejudiced against) to be garbage: unworkable, and a flawed user interface paradigm (I'm of the command line and late-nineties-style GUI persuasion). I don't use it on any of my devices except for getting the time when I'm in bed in the dark. I cannot imagine anybody would want to do anything with it. " My god are you wrong. I could try to meticulously refute each of your points, but honestly you are soo off, I can't even start. Just put a pin in your current world view and get back to me in 6 years when you as the last of your social circle begrudgingly get a voice assistant and realize how awesome they are in all their simple glory. Their primary usages are simple but effective. My google home allows me just say in kitchen while I'm cutting vegetables and have both my hands full "Hey google play music" I don't have to tell it what music, it just goes on spotify and continues what I've been playing. I can tell it something specific if I want though, a genre or playlist and it'll find it, and I've never experienced it get it wrong. Then when I'm done in the kitchen I can walk in with plates in hand, tell it to switch to romantic music on the way and "Hey google set the light in the living room to cozy", or if you're the lonely type, perhaps just tell it "Hey google play Rick and Morty" and it pops up on the chromecast on the tv. And this isn't some futuristic expectation of what will come. This is how I'm using it right now. Its obvious that Apple wants a piece of the action and it looks like they've gotten the memo that playing music is an important part of the apeal of these devices and actually put quality hardware in the box, that might win them a noticable market share.