3 ms·

> Siri has been close to useless for a decade and a half. The concrete value-measure for me is whether I would feel any loss as a user if Siri simply disappear

> Siri has been close to useless for a decade and a half. The concrete value-measure for me is whether I would feel any loss as a user if Siri simply disappeared. The answer is no, I would feel no loss. But this is also true for me if the subject is Gemini, CoPilot, Alexa, &c. For all the money and energy burned, for all the advertising babble and grotesque valuation, I would not as a user be one jot less productive if the invisible Thanos hand of the market made them all disappear at the end of this sentence.

mtrovo 2y ago
As an Android user I have to disagree, at least if we're comparing apples to apples (could not resist the pun). Google Assistant with Gemini (or whatever its name is this month) is really remarkable at helping with mundane tasks, and I would really miss it if it were gone. Circle to search, asking questions about my agenda, and setting up new events on my calendar based simply on taking photos of documents or posters is so convenient that I really buy the concept of having an AI personal assistant. And because this is a very sticky feature when delivered properly, if Apple is not involved it gives a very strong competitive advantage to Android flagships.
- heresie-dabord 2y ago
  It's not so much a question of disagreement. The fact that you have found value as a user is fine by me, of course! Maybe your use-cases should be captured by the Siri development team. If Siri has been useless for more than a decade, that also means that many users are barely using it, if at all. I'm not the only user of a system containing such applications that has found zero concrete value in them.
  - dboreham 2y ago
    Which voice assistants are useful?
samatman 2y ago
My life would rapidly fall apart. I use Siri for about three things: timers, reminders, and asking about the weather. But the reminders are mission critical. I use the watch, and any time my flighty brain hits on something, I set a reminder for it on the spot. I literally couldn't get along without it. The only killer feature of Siri is accurate voice transcription, and that's all I need (and it could be more accurate, I just get used to comical translations when I use a rare word). I guess I wouldn't mind if it were better, but I don't need it to be. Reminders are enough.

mtrovo 2y ago

As an Android user I have to disagree, at least if we're comparing apples to apples (could not resist the pun). Google Assistant with Gemini (or whatever its name is this month) is really remarkable at helping with mundane tasks, and I would really miss it if it were gone. Circle to search, asking questions about my agenda, and setting up new events on my calendar based simply on taking photos of documents or posters is so convenient that I really buy the concept of having an AI personal assistant. And because this is a very sticky feature when delivered properly, if Apple is not involved it gives a very strong competitive advantage to Android flagships.

heresie-dabord 2y ago
It's not so much a question of disagreement. The fact that you have found value as a user is fine by me, of course! Maybe your use-cases should be captured by the Siri development team. If Siri has been useless for more than a decade, that also means that many users are barely using it, if at all. I'm not the only user of a system containing such applications that has found zero concrete value in them.
- dboreham 2y ago
  Which voice assistants are useful?

samatman 2y ago

My life would rapidly fall apart. I use Siri for about three things: timers, reminders, and asking about the weather. But the reminders are mission critical. I use the watch, and any time my flighty brain hits on something, I set a reminder for it on the spot. I literally couldn't get along without it. The only killer feature of Siri is accurate voice transcription, and that's all I need (and it could be more accurate, I just get used to comical translations when I use a rare word). I guess I wouldn't mind if it were better, but I don't need it to be. Reminders are enough.