Has Apple changed the game with Siri?

Few will have missed the unveiling of the iPhone 4S. Central to the launch was the introduction of a voice activated assistant which allows users of the phone to talk to it and get information or perform commands. Questions such as “do I have any meetings on Friday afternoon?” change the way we think about a mobile phone.  I use my smartphone as a communication device and as a source for information but even with a highly visual interface I don’t really enjoy searching for content on it.  It’s just not a big enough form factor.  Voice commands change all that.  By simply talking to it, I can get the information without having to type it several times.  I think voice will change the way we use smartphones but also what kind of content we access.  The old adage that only get what you ask for applies.  When we type we express ourselves very differently from when we talk, so what we get back is different. It’s the difference between calling someone to ask a question and emailing them.  We get subtly different content.  I’ve no real idea where this takes us but I’m pretty sure that we’ll see an explosion in news types of content that voice driven requests will create.  As someone yesterday suggested, imagine using the voice command to enable your phone to talk to someone in another language.  An instant translator if you like.  Lastly, voice commands pushes natural language searching miles forward and as we know, when we improve search we improve what we find.  When we improve what we find, people get very rich…

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