Neoco

As it goes, I’d say I’m pretty good at the friends malarkey. I remember key dates, backstories and whereabouts, am always there for an obligatory shoulder to cry on or a drink to celebrate; for dinner, dancing or directions. So after a day with Siri, I thought we’d be getting on like a house on fire – but I was wrong.

First off Siri is a he and an annoying semi British-American he at that. Although you can change the accent to the more soothing tones of a lady friend, even then you need to adopt a fair share of Americanisms and swot up on your US English to be able to communicate with Siri effectively.

Reviews said Siri had problems with accents and although I may drop the occasional T and have the charming trait of mispronouncing the odd word with a Saarf London twang,  I am by no stretch of the imagination a mumbling, ineloquent burbler. But yet very often Siri still has trouble deciphering what I’m saying as the below debacle illustrates.

A simple request to call my mum, Siri translate to the Americanism ‘mom’, realises I don’t have a contact under that name, then attempts to spout something about Italian when I try to tell it that my mother’s name is Mum.

Siri  favours the personal touch; it calls you by your name a LOT. Sometimes endearing, often annoying and slightly off-putting, your name usually appears with a “Sorry” preceding it indicating Siri’s inability to complete the requested task. Hmph.

Saying that, if you’ve ever fancied changing your name and couldn’t face the legal and administrative turmoil of the Deed Poll method, just tell Siri and it’ll call you whatever you like from then on in. Get creative with your new aliases, there’s definitely fun to be had on this one.

One of Siri’s main pains is its inability to access small businesses in the UK. If Siri could run my social life as well as my worklife, it’d be an absolute winner. But until Apple teams up with a listings provider in the UK to provide searches for businesses such as shops, galleries, eateries, drinking establishments – basically anywhere you’d actually would want to go – Siri remains slightly lacking. Although you can bypass this by instructing Siri to search for places via Google maps, it would be nice to have the full set of features US customers have. Come on Yell!

Siri, it turns out, is at early stages of development; contstantly learning. I did wonder in some situations whether it would be quicker to get a human, ie me, to do the job myself, but that’s no fun right? In fact New York based film maker Casey Neistat has done just that, pairing his real assistant off against Siri for some pretty entertaining viewing.

The verdict: Maybe I was expecting too much from, let’s face it, a voice recognition device, but bonding with Siri is like talking to an apologetic and very placid old gentleman permanently wearing a wry smile – interesting, a little inappropriate and with a long way to go before he’s completely clued up.

After our day of failed bonding, I realised Siri is good for organising the work side of things just less so for the actual fun stuff. Bummer. So last night when Siri and I were tucked up in bed, I thought I’d butter him up…

“I love you.” This is the profound reply Siri returned:

Don’t say I didn’t try.

For more giggles on Siri’s responses, check out shitsirisays.com

Tags  Apple iPhone Siri voice recognition Yell