A report from earlier this month revealed that in a private beta testing of HomePod OS 12, it was discovered that Apple could be getting ready to launch a feature for the HomePod in which it would support making phone calls. For those wondering about it, you’ll be pleased to learn that the reports were true.
When you think of digital assistants, admittedly Siri might not be the first name that comes to mind. This is due to the fact that despite Siri sort of being the first digital assistant to be launched on modern day smartphones, it isn’t quite as accurate or as fast or as comprehensive compared to the competition.
With Amazon’s Alexa and Echo speakers touting a ton of functionality across various connected objects, one of the main criticisms of Apple’s HomePod is that it seems to be lacking in the “smarts” department. To be fair Apple has marketed the speaker as being more audio-focused, but given that it houses Siri, it’s hard not to draw the comparisons.
Back in the day when digital assistants required users to press a button to launch them, launching them accidentally wasn’t as prevalent as today. These days we’re seeing more instances of how digital assistants are accidentally launching due to it hearing phrases which sounds like its trigger phrase.
We know that Sonos has integrated Alexa into its speakers and that’s largely thanks to Amazon who decided right out of the gate that they would make Alexa available to third-party developers and companies. However not everyone likes or wants to use Alexa as some might prefer Google Assistant or even Siri.
For the longest time ever, Siri was limited to Apple’s own apps and services, although Apple later opened it up to developers. The good news is that if you’re an iOS or macOS user that uses Spotify to stream their music, it seems that you might soon be able to use Siri to control music streaming services such as Spotify.
One of the new features that Apple announced in iOS 12 is that Siri would be getting a new feature called Shortcuts. This is essentially similar to Google Home’s Routines where you could group together a bunch of different commands that Siri could execute at all once. For example in the morning you could get it to open the blinds, turn on the coffee machine, crank the thermostat, and so […]
Apple’s HomePods is probably one of the most expensive smart speakers in the market today, but that’s not surprising considering that Apple products are usually priced at a premium. Unfortunately it seems that its price could be one of the reasons why not many are adopting the speakers as much as Apple would like.
It is obvious that there is a clear advantage of having devices that are always listening for voice commands because it means you can access it from a distances and not fiddle with buttons. It is more definitely more efficient. However there is also a disadvantage and that is it is always listening.
Apple’s HomePod was launched not too long ago, but its initial launch was limited to a handful of markets which was an interesting choice given that Apple typically releases its products worldwide usually at the same time. However the good news is that if you live in France, Germany, or Japan, you could be getting the HomePod soon.
There are many digital assistants in the market today, and obviously not all of them were created equal and according to a recent study conducted by Stone Temple, it seems that they have found that Google Assistant is the most accurate digital assistant amongst the competition, at least as far as this year is concerned.
Siri was probably one of the first digital assistants to be launched on modern smartphones, but unfortunately as much as it was heralded at its unveiling, reality proved to be a much different story. Granted Apple has made improvements to Siri over time, but comparisons in the past have shown that the competition seems to be performing better.
If you’ve ever used a digital assistant on a smartphone, like Siri, Google Assistant, Cortana, or Alexa, you know that there will be a trigger word that you have to say to activate it. In the case of Apple’s Siri, it’s “Hey Siri” as its trigger word, but how did Apple land up on that particular phrase?