Anticipation is building among iPhone users as they eagerly await the announcement of enhancements to a feature that has been a source of frustration for years. The feature in question is Siri, Apple’s digital assistant, which was first introduced in 2011 with the iPhone 4s. Users had high hopes for Siri, envisioning a future where the assistant would be an integral part of their daily lives. While Siri excels at setting timers or alarms, outpacing even Google Assistant in speed, it falls short when it comes to answering more complex queries.
Take, for instance, a simple question about the release date of the first iPhone. Instead of providing a straightforward answer, Siri presents excerpts from three different websites, with only the last one containing the correct date of June 29, 2007. This process requires the user to sift through multiple sources of information, which is neither quick nor convenient. In contrast, Google Assistant provides the correct date instantly.
This discrepancy becomes even more glaring when you consider that Siri struggles to provide accurate information about Apple’s most iconic product. Users are forced to comb through multiple websites to find the answer to their question, whereas the iOS version of the Google Assistant app presents the release date of the first iPhone clearly and concisely, complete with a photo of the product’s unveiling by Steve Jobs on January 9th of that year.
Despite Siri’s apparent lack of knowledge about Apple’s history, or at least its inability to match Google Assistant’s proficiency in this area, it’s worth noting that Siri is still a valuable tool for setting clocks, alarms, opening apps, and making vocal requests about your iPhone. However, for more complex queries, I would recommend that iOS users download and use the iOS Google Assistant app, which is available on the App Store.
According to a report by Windows Central, Apple is developing a Large Language Model known as Reference Resolution As Language Modeling (ReALM). This would enable Siri to understand the context of a conversation and even comprehend the content displayed on the screen. A recent paper published by researchers highlights Apple’s plans to leverage AI to enhance Siri’s capabilities. The smallest AI model that Apple might include with iOS 18 has already met performance benchmarks set by OpenAI’s GPT-4, while Apple’s larger AI model has surpassed it by a significant margin.
While it remains to be seen whether these AI improvements will enable Siri to provide quicker and more precise answers, there’s no harm in hoping for the best.