iPhone 4S: Look what we stole from Android!
So, it has voice commands like my Android based phones have had for years? Cutting edge there!
Also, this past weekend, my DroidX did a software upgrade. The thing I noticed most about the upgrade is that they tried to make the software look more iPhony with flashy rotating screens, rounded edges, and how the windows move. Much more iPhone in appearance.
October 5th, 2011 at 9:30 am
You should look into rooting your phone and going with some of the modded vanilla Android builds. I just loaded a http://www.cyanogenmod.com/ build on to my Thunderbolt, and I am blown away with how good it is.
October 5th, 2011 at 1:10 pm
Sounds like you got Gingerbread.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:14 pm
Your Android phone was doing that Siri stuff years ago? That’s not what the press is saying.
http://searchengineland.com/how-siri-patches-up-the-iphones-voice-search-weakness-vs-android-95665
October 5th, 2011 at 3:18 pm
You know I don’t care what the press says. And that whole, I know because I have one thing.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:20 pm
The point being it sounds like Siri is a bit different…and better.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:25 pm
So, they steal it and make it a little better? Why, it’s exactly like we just had this conversation.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:32 pm
Improving on phones that went before? Only stealing when Apple does it, I remember.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:35 pm
I sure hope Apple “steals” things when they’re obviously superior (ie. Android-style notifications in iOS 5), or when they’re a good idea that could use some improvement (voice recognition).
(cf. the typical blather about Xerox PARC and how Xerox Totally Invented Mice And Guis And Everyone Just “Stole” That.
Sure, Apple and the X Window System guys and Microsoft “stole” the mouse and GUI.
And made them actually useful.)
I just wish Google and the Android front-end makers would do more of it in the other direction and provide better competition, especially in the tablet space.
(Rather than just Samsunging things and copying packaging slavishly, which is cheap.)
On the Siri thing, it sure seems like none of the people I know with Android phones think the voice recognition is just like it. Note the difference is not “being able to tell what words you said”, but knowing how to act on them.
Android can take voice commands; “Call X”, for instance. Google has a list for their implementation. It supports ten basic commands with some variation.
To use Apple’s example, “So when you ask “Any good burger joints around here?” Siri will reply “I found a number of burger restaurants near you.” ”
It’s not clear from Google’s example that even “Search here for hamburgers” will work, let alone natural English search parsing.
It’s the “natural English” part that’s new and interesting and makes it potentially-awesome. Not “voice commands”.
(Google could presumably relatively easily add weather and location proximity search and reminder/alarm adding to Voice Commands.
What they have no indication of at all is any natural-language parsing ability. That will be huge in terms of usability, if Apple can pull it off.
And I’m pretty sure Apple can pull it off.)
October 5th, 2011 at 3:39 pm
Quit confusing our host’s Apple is evil rant with facts, man.
October 5th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
The google system is a bit more direct. Instead of “any good burger joints’ for instance, you’d say ‘find burgers’ or some such. And it works fine. Seems like mine recognizes more than 10 commands but I’d have to play with it.
October 5th, 2011 at 4:13 pm
Meh, Windows Phone 7 been there and done that too. Plus runs better to boot.
October 5th, 2011 at 5:54 pm
Dude, the HTC Win mobile phone I had years ago had voice commands.
You ok there buddy? Got something stuck in your craw?
October 5th, 2011 at 7:18 pm
The new iPhone 4S does NOT have the same voice commands like what the Android has had for years. The current iOS and other phones may have had the same thing as the Android has had for years. The Siri that comes with the new iOS 5 based iPhone 4S is totally different interactive experience.
October 5th, 2011 at 9:03 pm
You demean yourself with these silly attacks. If it is truly better, the market will will decide and reward it. Let the value speak for itself. Android needs no Jesuits. Apple needs no martyrs.
And, btw, it is a PHONE. Don’t get your panties in a twist.
October 5th, 2011 at 9:12 pm
You demean yourself with these silly attacks. If it is truly better, the market will will decide and reward it.
If that were true, Microsoft never would have survived as a company 🙂
October 6th, 2011 at 12:24 am
Microsoft is very good at marketing, and positioning itself.
Not everyone uses their head to make decisions. And not everyone needs the same things. I play a lot of online games. I need to use Windows 7 for this.
“Better” is always in the eye of the beholder.
October 6th, 2011 at 8:56 am
As a corollary to what my alter ego noted, it’s kinda hard to explain Cisco’s dominance as well under that rubric. 🙂
But I get what you’re saying…the Apple bashing is just funny to me.
It’s a bloomin phone. They all have pluses and minuses. There are a few things I wish my iPhone4 did better, but it doesn’t have me yelling and screaming the way everyone I know with an Android is when they start dickering around with it.
October 6th, 2011 at 10:50 am
As for the “stealin'” meme, recall how much Apple is “competing” via litigation these days.
October 6th, 2011 at 7:13 pm
As for the “stealin’” meme, recall how much Apple is “competing” via litigation these days.
Thanks to ridiculous patent laws that allow patents for everything under the sun, that’s par for the course in the tech industry. You have companies buying other companies just for their patent portfolios, not so they can make use of the patent, but so they can use it to beat other companies over the head with. There’s few tech companies out there that aren’t guilty of this.