[Russic]

Originally Posted by TorqueDog

My greatest fears have been confirmed; people are becoming more and more helpless. "Remind me I need gas at 9 am tomorrow"?? Dude, the fuel gauge on the car should tell you that you need to refuel, you really need your phone to tell you this stuff?

Even though you were a little condescending with this little chestnut I'm going to do my best to not offer it back (I'll most likely fail). I had to go to the airport this morning which is a 45 minute drive for me. If I need to be there at 10 and I leave at 9:15, letting my fuel gauge remind me I need gas is actually kind of a problem! You see, it would add roughly 10 minutes to my trip, which would make me late. If I make the reminder for 15 minutes before I leave I have time to get the gas.

More importantly, you really needed the capability of a voice command processor to do it for you?

Of course not. I also don't need an online calendar or a contact list in gmail, but I use them because I use technology to make my life easier. What confuses me about you is that you get that.

I appreciate an interface that allows me to spend as little time on my phone as possible while getting as much information/as much done as I desire.

That's what Siri is. You are arguing against the removal of several steps to make a process easier, yet you (quite rightly) feel making things easier for the user is important.

And please tell me what is easier about saying "What's the weather like tomorrow?" as opposed to the than clicking "Weather" on your front screen? 3 seconds to say versus 1 second to click the button on the screen.

Here we have what I feel is the biggest difference between us. Those 2 seconds are damn important to me. Needless clicks in a website don't necessarily add a lot of time to the navigation, but almost everybody finds them aggravating (oftentimes enough to never use the offending site again if they don't have to). Making a 3 second process a 1 second process is a very big deal to me.

Secondly, it's not 2 seconds. Just because I'm such a nerd, I did a test. I set up an appointment and timed myself (yes I have better things to do right now, but I'm arguing on the internet so it can wait). Results:
Siri - 16 seconds, 1 button tap
Traditional - 36 seconds, roughly 15 taps not including the actual typing of the words (home button --> unlock slider --> 4 digit passcode --> home button to escape app i was in --> tap on calendar --> tap on title field --> enter info --> tap on time --> enter info --> tap on reminder field --> tap done button).

Yes there are better apps than iCal to do this, but that's what most people use. The passcode is actually a big part of the puzzle. I have too much on my phone to ever go without it, but it adds a rather significant barrier to getting things done. Using Siri really drives this point home because you don't need to enter it.

Originally Posted by Titan

How often do you have to restate what you are asking for?

I was surprised. It certainly isn't dead-simple out the gate, but for me the problem was in the speed at which you have to string things together. It obviously tries to be very efficient, so if you leave gaps in your speech the mic turns off and it starts working. This is problematic if you don't think out your phrases. For instance if you say "text my wife tell her I'll be 15 minutes late (brief pause) ask her..." You're already screwed because the pause started the process. You can't even pause between "text my wife" and "tell her...". In my experience it works best to just drive through it.

The actual words themselves come through surprisingly well. There are of course hiccups along the way but nothing like I've seen with other tech.