Siri, Apple’s “one more thing” at last week’s iPhone 4S launch, looks like some kind of magic from the future. But then, demoes of speech control on the Mac also looked pretty good (yes, you can control your Mac with your voice — kinda). Up on stage, with just the right commands, Siri was bound to make a great demo. But how will it do in the real world?
To see, check out this hands-on video from the folks at UK-based mag Stuff.
I’m sure the outtakes have been, ahem, taken out, but what remains is impressive. Not only does it look accurate, but it also looks useful. I can totally see myself mumbling drunkenly to Siri to please, please wake me up in the morning, or sending a quick message to somebody.
Other hands-on reviews around the web also point to another way to activate Siri. Instead of touching the button on screen, you can just hold the phone up to your ear. This way you’ll look like you’re talking to somebody, instead of dorking out with your little iHal.
But most impressive is that Siri can handle different accents, something that the iOS Dragon apps fail miserably at. We’ll have to see how it copes with other British accents though. In the U.S, English accents are fairly homogenous. In the British Isles, though, you run from Scottish to Irish to Geordie to Black Country to (shudder) Welsh. Some natives have trouble understanding these accents, so I don’t have much hope for a computer.
I do like the posh-accented Butler voice used in the British English version of Siri, though.
Still, we’ll find out soon enough when folks start to receive their handsets this Friday and start commanding Siri to do all sorts of crazy things. Me? I’ll do what I always have done whenever possible, just like I still do when I get a new dictionary. I’ll start with the swear words.
Apple iPhone 4S Siri demo [Stuff TV/YouTube]
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