Apple acquires virtual assistant search app maker Siri
By Laura June 
posted April 28th 2010 7:07PM
posted April 28th 2010 7:07PM
Apple has acquired Siri, a company that makes a virtual assistant app. Siri was inspired by DARPA's CALO -- the Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes -- project. Originally designed to help streamline military personnel's activities, the consumer app focuses on helping you find things like restaurants, making use of speech recognition to boot. Essentially a smart search, there's plenty of speculation of course as to what this means about the direction that Apple might be taking... and that direction seems to lead towards Google-y territory. Now we don't want to speculate too much, but we'll be watching to see how this plays out over the next few weeks. The terms of the acquisition aren't known, meaning we have no idea how much Apple paid for the small startup, but Business Insider guesses the deal could be worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $100 to $200 million.
That's dope. They better not NERF it. It would really cool to intergrate that into the search or like the voice dialing thing. Speak "nearest potty"
Answer "Down the street at Starbucks near all the hipsters" Nah.. I'll hold it. lol
SIRI IS AWESOME! Some one had to buy it. I was just talking about this a few days ago with my friend. BEST VOICE RECOGNITION SOFTWARE EVER!
Is it good or bad that all these small startup companies are being bought by large corporations?
@Shadow08:
Baaaad. I can see why the owners want to "cash out" basically, but when these large companies own and control everything, it's bad. Especially when that large company is Apple because they're afraid of competition.
@Jordan
Afraid of competition? I'll ignore the fact that you're basically talking about the hottest growth stock in the tech industry... Apple doesn't have anything like Siri. That's why they bought it. They're planning to incorporate those voice services into future products, and that's a good thing.
Cashing out sounds like... the guys just started the company to make a quick buck. You don't go to Apple to make a quick buck, you go to Apple to work on the coolest tech in the world. I'm guessing the Siri guys are ecstatic, and not just because of the money.
Wow apple is playing catch up but boy did they snag a winner.
Just imagine by activating the voice control on the iPhone
You will be able to get a cab, search for local movie theaters or events. Book a restaurant. Check what the weather is like before going out to run and then create a genius playlist. Call a friend , local search.
Playing around with sir I asked it hookers near me.
It yielded strip club results lol.
I booked a table at this jap restaurant by using sir.
I can see apple integrating it deeply into iPhone os.
@FrankDTank
They've already registered "iGuide" a while back. Could just be an App. The cool thing is, Apple can roll this out to work on iDevices and iMacs too. If the tech is good enough, with Apple's UI savvy... it could be very useful and fun to use.
http://www.macrumors.com/2009/12/28/another-buried-apple-trademark-iguide-as-an-alternative-name-to-islate/
right thing to do, now heavily integrate it in OS and make that phone awesome.
Finally the phone will be a true personal assistant.
OH my god 2 Apple Posts in a Row this site is almost as lame as Gizmodo now, screw this im switching to cNet... /sarcasm
but seriously Apple give me a call when you get voice controlled texting and email... ill be over here unimpressed til then
@Wiizer If what you say is true, that means Google's trademark does not hold anymore, and someone can legally create a search engine called Google2 or BetterGoogle.
Oh boy, askjeeves for the iPhone. There can never be enough crummy search engines with a cheesy veneer. Now that android has passed iphone os in web usage, Jobs is getting desperate. Well, it was fun while it lasted.
@LeStar
According to who? Admob, lol.
@LeStar
LOL!!!!!! That was rich
@Dr Kwame Nkrumah I was thinking the same thing. Google says Google is the best. Lol
@Dr Kwame Nkrumah Dude... one feature phone will never be able to maintain dominance over a host of amazing powerful smartphones... get over it
@SteveyAyo
Keep dreaming moron.
@SteveyAyo
We're going into iPhone 4 now.. So... its not really 1 phone. It's like 4, all with various price points and storage sizes.... tied to the best MF-in' App Store the world has ever seen.
I remember when I first saw the promotional video for Siri, thinking that the product reminded me of the Knowledge Navigator video that was put together in the Sculley era. How curious.
Looks like Apple is playing follow the leader. Eat it apple fanboys...
@MattTX yeah still catching up to the Apple Knowledge Navigator Concept. It'll take a while.
yawn..uh HP bought Palm.
did u say "Google-y"?....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jgp94-KgA0E&feature=related
sorry, i couldn't resist...
Is anyone else getting sick of all these companies' acquisitions and posturing and lawsuits and blood feuds and wish someone would just go ahead and fucking MAKE something for once? This nonsense isn't what I became a nerd for.
@Shunnabunich With acquisistion comes ability.
it's going to be used to compete against android's voice search
I see something here. Remember back to the iPhone tickets patent. So in iSiri, you search (or say) "concerts near by" and you get the nearest concerts AND the ability to buy tickets.
Who cares? Just another technology that Apple didn't invent, bought, will implement, and then force out all competition due to "copying system function".
The big news here is HP bought Palm.
@Jordan
And this is just another stupid comment from you.
This is an excellent purchase for Apple and will enable it to provide what I've wanted from Dragon Search, Dictation and Siri since I first started using them, the ability to do almost anything on my iPhone via voice.
Text Bob: On my way, see you in 5 minutes.
Email Susan: Want to do dinner tonight?
Apple has the opportunity really enhance the user experience, after successfully eliminating most of the buttons from the mobile device (and inspiring others to do the same), it can can eliminate many of the button presses we're making on our touch screens (and again hopefully inspire others to do the same). Very exciting news.
*decides to go walk to a place which sells cake instead of bagels*
Siri: "You're not even going the right way. You should have turned Left before."
*walks into cake shop*
Siri: "Turn back, or I Will Kill You."
*orders cake*
Siri: "I'm going to kill you, and all the cake is gone."
Does this mean Apple is going to resurrect the Knowledge Navigator project?
But can it find Gizmodo HQ
yeah, great success.
well, get some more apple apps and free resources, tips, go to this apple spot: http://www.ifunia.com/resources.html
Steve Jobs: "We didn't go into search. They (Google) went into phones."
@bluelobe
I'm not sure you understand what Siri is.
Does this mean the end of their plans to bring Siri to other platforms, particularly Android?
@Rockey04
I was wondering the same thing too. Their app was prominently featured on droiddoes.com earlier this month, but I just went back to check and it is now gone :(
@(Unverified)
Wait! They already had this for Android or did they just put a nonexistent app on DroidDoes?
Oh noes...
Is Apple siri-ous?
@ScifiSurfer
Why So Siri-ous?
So, wait, isn't this basically Vlingo, but with a snazzier UI?
Siri has the potential to be a bigger revenue generator than AdWords.
Smart move, Siri is one of my favorite apps.
I think it would be awesome to integrate this into the iMacs and other desktops. It would be like having a virtual butler akin to the JARVIS system in the Iron Man movies. They featured a story on here a few weeks ago about a guy who rigged that up. Apple could just make a better, more fully integrated version.
Imagine if you had more than one desktop up in your house, or your Macbook, and it used the microphones to pick up the direction of the sound of your voice as you walked through the house. Then it gave the results of the search on the nearest computer to you.