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The Original Siri App Gets Pulled From The App Store, Servers Killed

69 points by tilt 15y ago

ck2 15y ago
Doesn't voice processing go "through the cloud" ? Doesn't Google do this for free on Android via their servers? http://www.google.com/mobile/voice-actions/ http://www.google.com/mobile/voice-actions/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGbYVvU0Z5s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGbYVvU0Z5s
- koopajah 15y ago
  Voice processing through the cloud is one way to do it. It allows to perform the CPU consuming part of Voice Recognition on remote powerful servers but to do so you must be connected to internet, it's harder to include your "local" info (own contacts, own music, etc) With a chip powerful enough you can do the voice recognition directly with your phone as it is done in a lot of devices embedded currently in cars for contact/music recognition.
  - ConstantineXVI 15y ago
    Not necessarily, all the remote servers have to do is churn voice into text. Your phone can handle the sorting through your local data just fine once the voice is processed.
    - koopajah 15y ago
      Of course, you can do Speech to text and THEN analyzes the text to find the "intent", but on embedded devices it is easier to "plan" what is the vocabulary that you want to support and then perform recognition based on this vocabulary. At least on low CPU/RAM embedded devices.
      - adambyrtek 15y ago
        Only when the space is limited and enumerable, like on legacy GPS devices that keep a complete routing database. Android voice actions are much more powerful, allowing you to search for any phrase, get directions to a given place, send arbitrary text messages etc. The possibilities are effectively infinite.
    - biot 15y ago
      Except that your data will get split between local and remote. "Book a return flight to visit mom the next time a flight is under $250". Either your device needs to know all about flight times or the remote server needs to know where mom lives, even if she moves. Throw everything into iCloud and there's no need for local processing -- either the audio of your speech or the transcription of your speech is sent to the remote server and everything is done there.
- watty 15y ago
  I'm not positive but I would guess that most voice processing on Android is local such as "call mom". Stuff like transcribing voice mails for Google Voice is done on the cloud.
  - sp332 15y ago
    Nope, all the (native) speech-recognition goes through Google servers. It won't work offline.
droithomme 15y ago
Ok so people purchased this product and were using it. Apple then bought the company, and made the product (which until today worked perfectly fine on current hardware) an exclusive on their new hardware, requiring significant cost of upgrading, and then they dismantled the old product and prevented their legitimate owners from using them any more, all in order to force the customers to do an expensive hardware upgrade if they wanted to keep using their product. It's pretty amazing that this sort of thuggish strongarm tactic is a legal business practice. It's comparable to car manufacturers using OnStar to disable the brakes on 2011 models as soon as the 2012 ones come out.
- Bud 15y ago
  This is inaccurate (and hyperbolic). My copy of Siri is working just fine, on my iPhone 4.
  - droithomme 15y ago
    OK, so then the article is inaccurate, correct? I am commenting on the claims made in the article, which if true, are disturbing. If they are not true, then there's nothing to see here and all is fine.
    - Bud 15y ago
      Yeah, not your fault. TechCrunch jumped the gun on this story. There was a blip when they updated the servers, but Siri has been working fine since then. However, it is true that if you did not get Siri BEFORE today's announcement, you have to wait for the 4S, because they have pulled Siri from the App Store, which makes sense. Here's the update that TechCrunch posted recently: Update: After a brief downtime, the servers came back up.. with a message of their impending demise: “I’ve been replaced! The new Siri is even smarter and better looking than me, and waiting for you on the iPhone 4S. I’ll be leaving for home Oct 15th. Until then…how can I help you?”
      - jkincaid 15y ago
        That message sounds to me like the servers will be taken down on October 15 (not just the app, but the actual service). Am I misreading it?
erickhill 15y ago
For many iPhone 4 early adopters who can't live without Siri but want the experience, this means either 1) waiting until mid-November and doing a "free" upgrade via ATT's 20-month allowance or 2) waiting 6 months and finally jumping ship to Verizon once the current contract expires. Disappointed this is an "exclusive" app, but I want to live in a Star Trek world, too. Might as well go all-in and give ATT the bird on the way out, even if just on principle.
- veyron 15y ago
  Sprint is also getting the iPhone 4S, so people could jump ship to Sprint ...
- Bud 15y ago
  Not true at all. I've been using Siri since June or so, on my iPhone 4. It's been on the App Store at least that long. If you are really an early adopter and really wanted this app so badly, you could have downloaded it, and could be using it right now.
  - spinchange 15y ago
    ...Until 10/15 after which you'll have to buy a completely new phone to continue using it. They are taking away existing functionality that has been available to users for almost 2 years and relaunching it as the primary 'exclusive' feature on new, more expensive hardware. It's also still throwing the same error as shown in the TC post for many users, myself included.
    - dextorious 15y ago
      Any reason why you believe the Siri app sold previously is the EXACT same functionality as that inside iPhone 4S? For one, I believe the iPhone 4S version works offline too. If so, the "relaunching" part is not accurate, as you imply that what got relaunch is the SAME exact thing that was previously available.
      - 15y ago
salman89 15y ago
I would guess that Apple will now use the phone to handle most of the Siri computations, and that in this old Siri app it was being done server side. This is why 4S is required. Having the app out there for a while likely gave Siri great users to test out their system with and improve upon it before launching mass integrated with the OS.
- Kylekramer 15y ago
  From http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/siri.html http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/siri.html: Siri is available in Beta only on iPhone 4S and requires Internet access. Systemic obsolescence, plain and simple.
  - salman89 15y ago
    Right, processing the Siri commands locally instead of on a server might require more CPU horsepower that the iPhone 4 cannot handle. Just my best guess as a non-iPhone4S upsell reason for it being iPhone 4S only. The fact that it requires an internet connection may not mean anything. You don't necessarily know why it needs an internet connection. Things like search or feeding back use data can be non computational reasons for requiring an internet connection.
  - dextorious 15y ago
    You keep using that word, "Systemic obsolescence". I don't think it means what you think it means. For one, it doesn't mean "buying a company that makes a product, stop selling that product standalone and bundle it with your own offering". It means adding an artificial end-of-life to functionality in the things you sell. Not to stop selling (or in this case offering) a thing altogether. If that was the case, any company discontinuing any product life (Apple discontinuing the Powerbooks e.g) would be "systemic obsolescence" too... From wikipedia: "Planned systemic obsolescence is the deliberate attempt to make a product obsolete by altering the system in which it is used in such a way as to make its continued use difficult. "
Splines 15y ago
What MSFT absolutely nails in this arena is the experience in the XBL marketplace. If you buy something, it's yours forever (well, longer than in the app store, anyway). Many many games have been pulled, usually because the owner of the game has gone out of business, but if you've bought that game you can go and download it again at any time. Device licensing is also straightforward, whereas if I sync apps purchased under different apple ids to my iPhone I can get really bizarre behavior with on-phone updates and app-purchasing (sometimes it changes who it thinks I am, depending on some combination of who's app I synced/updated last, or something). It's something that I wish I could to in the App Store. I need to keep tabs on my IPAs in case there's an app that I bought that is no longer available. In this day and age I shouldn't need to do that. Apple's implementation of this category of stuff feels really rough.
- inconditus 15y ago
  The article explains that people with the application downloaded wouldn't be able to access it because it requires a call to a server that was down. Although this is the fault with Apple for Siri, third party apps calling defunct servers will also have this problem.
- martingordon 15y ago
  > It's something that I wish I could to in the App Store. I need to keep tabs on my IPAs in case there's an app that I bought that is no longer available. In this day and age I shouldn't need to do that. With the new iCloud stuff, you can go into the Purchased page on the iTunes Store and download any app you've ever downloaded, including those that are no longer available in the store.
  - Splines 15y ago
    That's great to hear, I didn't know that :)
  - itsnotvalid 15y ago
    In Siri's case you can't even download the app right now. Of course downloading would mean nothing, because the server for that app is closing on Oct 15.
atmz 15y ago
The article makes no mention of the fact that the Siri app was free. What possible obligation does Apple have to continue to provide a service to "customers", when these users have not bought any product or service, and Apple itself didn't even own the app when the service began. Lots of people seem to think that we have a right to continued access to free web apps/services just because once something is given it can't be taken away; this obviously isn't true. This particular case is just Apple being a business and isn't even particularly egregious.
mal1031 15y ago
I am now getting "Sorry, a problem occurred receiving response from the server." I guess that the server for this version has been shut down. :(

69 points by tilt 15y ago

ck2 15y ago

Doesn't voice processing go "through the cloud" ? Doesn't Google do this for free on Android via their servers? http://www.google.com/mobile/voice-actions/ http://www.google.com/mobile/voice-actions/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGbYVvU0Z5s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGbYVvU0Z5s

koopajah 15y ago
Voice processing through the cloud is one way to do it. It allows to perform the CPU consuming part of Voice Recognition on remote powerful servers but to do so you must be connected to internet, it's harder to include your "local" info (own contacts, own music, etc) With a chip powerful enough you can do the voice recognition directly with your phone as it is done in a lot of devices embedded currently in cars for contact/music recognition.
- ConstantineXVI 15y ago
  Not necessarily, all the remote servers have to do is churn voice into text. Your phone can handle the sorting through your local data just fine once the voice is processed.
  - koopajah 15y ago
    Of course, you can do Speech to text and THEN analyzes the text to find the "intent", but on embedded devices it is easier to "plan" what is the vocabulary that you want to support and then perform recognition based on this vocabulary. At least on low CPU/RAM embedded devices.
    - adambyrtek 15y ago
      Only when the space is limited and enumerable, like on legacy GPS devices that keep a complete routing database. Android voice actions are much more powerful, allowing you to search for any phrase, get directions to a given place, send arbitrary text messages etc. The possibilities are effectively infinite.
  - biot 15y ago
    Except that your data will get split between local and remote. "Book a return flight to visit mom the next time a flight is under $250". Either your device needs to know all about flight times or the remote server needs to know where mom lives, even if she moves. Throw everything into iCloud and there's no need for local processing -- either the audio of your speech or the transcription of your speech is sent to the remote server and everything is done there.
watty 15y ago
I'm not positive but I would guess that most voice processing on Android is local such as "call mom". Stuff like transcribing voice mails for Google Voice is done on the cloud.
- sp332 15y ago
  Nope, all the (native) speech-recognition goes through Google servers. It won't work offline.

droithomme 15y ago

Ok so people purchased this product and were using it. Apple then bought the company, and made the product (which until today worked perfectly fine on current hardware) an exclusive on their new hardware, requiring significant cost of upgrading, and then they dismantled the old product and prevented their legitimate owners from using them any more, all in order to force the customers to do an expensive hardware upgrade if they wanted to keep using their product. It's pretty amazing that this sort of thuggish strongarm tactic is a legal business practice. It's comparable to car manufacturers using OnStar to disable the brakes on 2011 models as soon as the 2012 ones come out.

Bud 15y ago
This is inaccurate (and hyperbolic). My copy of Siri is working just fine, on my iPhone 4.
- droithomme 15y ago
  OK, so then the article is inaccurate, correct? I am commenting on the claims made in the article, which if true, are disturbing. If they are not true, then there's nothing to see here and all is fine.
  - Bud 15y ago
    Yeah, not your fault. TechCrunch jumped the gun on this story. There was a blip when they updated the servers, but Siri has been working fine since then. However, it is true that if you did not get Siri BEFORE today's announcement, you have to wait for the 4S, because they have pulled Siri from the App Store, which makes sense. Here's the update that TechCrunch posted recently: Update: After a brief downtime, the servers came back up.. with a message of their impending demise: “I’ve been replaced! The new Siri is even smarter and better looking than me, and waiting for you on the iPhone 4S. I’ll be leaving for home Oct 15th. Until then…how can I help you?”
    - jkincaid 15y ago
      That message sounds to me like the servers will be taken down on October 15 (not just the app, but the actual service). Am I misreading it?

erickhill 15y ago

For many iPhone 4 early adopters who can't live without Siri but want the experience, this means either 1) waiting until mid-November and doing a "free" upgrade via ATT's 20-month allowance or 2) waiting 6 months and finally jumping ship to Verizon once the current contract expires. Disappointed this is an "exclusive" app, but I want to live in a Star Trek world, too. Might as well go all-in and give ATT the bird on the way out, even if just on principle.

veyron 15y ago
Sprint is also getting the iPhone 4S, so people could jump ship to Sprint ...
Bud 15y ago
Not true at all. I've been using Siri since June or so, on my iPhone 4. It's been on the App Store at least that long. If you are really an early adopter and really wanted this app so badly, you could have downloaded it, and could be using it right now.
- spinchange 15y ago
  ...Until 10/15 after which you'll have to buy a completely new phone to continue using it. They are taking away existing functionality that has been available to users for almost 2 years and relaunching it as the primary 'exclusive' feature on new, more expensive hardware. It's also still throwing the same error as shown in the TC post for many users, myself included.
  - dextorious 15y ago
    Any reason why you believe the Siri app sold previously is the EXACT same functionality as that inside iPhone 4S? For one, I believe the iPhone 4S version works offline too. If so, the "relaunching" part is not accurate, as you imply that what got relaunch is the SAME exact thing that was previously available.
    - 15y ago

salman89 15y ago

I would guess that Apple will now use the phone to handle most of the Siri computations, and that in this old Siri app it was being done server side. This is why 4S is required. Having the app out there for a while likely gave Siri great users to test out their system with and improve upon it before launching mass integrated with the OS.

Kylekramer 15y ago
From http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/siri.html http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/siri.html: Siri is available in Beta only on iPhone 4S and requires Internet access. Systemic obsolescence, plain and simple.
- salman89 15y ago
  Right, processing the Siri commands locally instead of on a server might require more CPU horsepower that the iPhone 4 cannot handle. Just my best guess as a non-iPhone4S upsell reason for it being iPhone 4S only. The fact that it requires an internet connection may not mean anything. You don't necessarily know why it needs an internet connection. Things like search or feeding back use data can be non computational reasons for requiring an internet connection.
- dextorious 15y ago
  You keep using that word, "Systemic obsolescence". I don't think it means what you think it means. For one, it doesn't mean "buying a company that makes a product, stop selling that product standalone and bundle it with your own offering". It means adding an artificial end-of-life to functionality in the things you sell. Not to stop selling (or in this case offering) a thing altogether. If that was the case, any company discontinuing any product life (Apple discontinuing the Powerbooks e.g) would be "systemic obsolescence" too... From wikipedia: "Planned systemic obsolescence is the deliberate attempt to make a product obsolete by altering the system in which it is used in such a way as to make its continued use difficult. "

Splines 15y ago

What MSFT absolutely nails in this arena is the experience in the XBL marketplace. If you buy something, it's yours forever (well, longer than in the app store, anyway). Many many games have been pulled, usually because the owner of the game has gone out of business, but if you've bought that game you can go and download it again at any time. Device licensing is also straightforward, whereas if I sync apps purchased under different apple ids to my iPhone I can get really bizarre behavior with on-phone updates and app-purchasing (sometimes it changes who it thinks I am, depending on some combination of who's app I synced/updated last, or something). It's something that I wish I could to in the App Store. I need to keep tabs on my IPAs in case there's an app that I bought that is no longer available. In this day and age I shouldn't need to do that. Apple's implementation of this category of stuff feels really rough.

inconditus 15y ago
The article explains that people with the application downloaded wouldn't be able to access it because it requires a call to a server that was down. Although this is the fault with Apple for Siri, third party apps calling defunct servers will also have this problem.
martingordon 15y ago
> It's something that I wish I could to in the App Store. I need to keep tabs on my IPAs in case there's an app that I bought that is no longer available. In this day and age I shouldn't need to do that. With the new iCloud stuff, you can go into the Purchased page on the iTunes Store and download any app you've ever downloaded, including those that are no longer available in the store.
- Splines 15y ago
  That's great to hear, I didn't know that :)
- itsnotvalid 15y ago
  In Siri's case you can't even download the app right now. Of course downloading would mean nothing, because the server for that app is closing on Oct 15.

atmz 15y ago

The article makes no mention of the fact that the Siri app was free. What possible obligation does Apple have to continue to provide a service to "customers", when these users have not bought any product or service, and Apple itself didn't even own the app when the service began. Lots of people seem to think that we have a right to continued access to free web apps/services just because once something is given it can't be taken away; this obviously isn't true. This particular case is just Apple being a business and isn't even particularly egregious.

mal1031 15y ago

I am now getting "Sorry, a problem occurred receiving response from the server." I guess that the server for this version has been shut down. :(