Siri – TechCommGeekMom

Today, 18 March 2024, I found this post on LinkedIn.com which briefly discusses that Apple is considering using Gemini AI from Google for their products.
Apple mulls Gemini for iPhones

Hey Apple, I’m really confused by this. You came out with Siri eons ago. In fact, between my own experiences between Google’s Alexa and Siri, while neither is perfect, Siri had always been the better voice bot. Siri’s been out longer, and has had a longer opportunity to build an LLM based on alllllll the conversations that people have had with Siri for more than a decade, easily. So how is it that Alexa, which generally does not perform as well and hasn’t been out as long, and that which I’m guessing is the foundation (or at least partial foundation) of Gemini, and you’re going with THEIR tool?

I’m a bit disappointed. This is truly Apple dropping the ball, as they say. Okay, sure, so there isn’t going to be an Apple car and there will be more focus on making CarPlay work harder. (I could use that, for sure.) But to think about defaulting to Google? No. I mean, at least look at what Microsoft is doing with their Open AI acquisition, or some other one. I don’t trust Google with so much of this. They’ve always been a little loosey-goosey with products and launches. You know you have the people–or can get the people–to help you out with this. You have the right infrastructure and a great foundation with Siri. Why stop now?

(Sorry, not sorry, Cortana, if you feel left out. Also a missed opportunity, but maybe you’re a CoPilot now or have a new identity that’s not Bing.)

What do you think? Do you think it’s a good thing or a not so good thing that Apple is looking at Gemini as its AI resource tool. Like I said, I’m not in favor of it. Post your thoughts below.

This just came out in the news today, which I saw through the Mashable feed. Google’s AI Assistant is really learning how to interact using natural language in a big way. The future, if it’s not now, is coming very soon!

If this is truly working, and I’m guessing it’ll be available to the public soon enough, it’s going to be kicking the back end of Siri and Alexa and Cortana. I’ve used Siri for a while now, and it’s not perfect, but it’s okay–it’s gotten better over the years. Alexa has been a bit of a disappointment to me–Siri can usually do better. With mixed results from those two, I haven’t really ventured into trying Cortana, but I’m willing to bet that it’s still not as developed as the Google Assistant.

How does this affect technical communicators? Big time. From what I can tell, this is about the chatbots and machine language learning that’s been talked about recently. But at the same time, it affects how we communicate through rhetoric or voice. Sometimes we take actual speaking for granted, and it’s when we try to describe something that one sees clearly that it becomes difficult. Or, sometimes we can write it out well, but can’t explain well in voice. This means that plain and very clear language is going to be helpful going forward as we develop the content for these AI assistants that will be developing.

Soon enough, we’ll be talking to HAL or to our starship’s computer with ease.

Scotty talking to a computer mouse. — When going back in time in Star Trek IV, Chief Engineer Scott forgot that there wasn’t AI in the late 1980s.

What do you think about this development? It’s exciting to me–enough to make me want to purchase a Google Assistant! It definitely raises the bar for Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon, for sure. Let some healthy competition begin! (And more tech comm jobs associated with it!) Include your thoughts below.