

Google is close to releasing Siri rival called Majel - kurtvarner
http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/google-is-close-to-releasing-siri-rival-called-majel-20111213/

======
drats
I fairly certain Google can leapfrog Apple here, it's a machine learning
company with big data built into its DNA vs. a computer company with Siri
grafted on. Google simply has more training data and more expertise to build
this on top of their already impressive voice recognition (which like their
translation facilities just smoothly gets better and better).

I am also certain people will scream that Apple "invented" this despite the
decades of public and private research on the problem and the fact that IBM's
Watson (far more impressive than Siri) was released and won Jeopardy before
Siri was even launched.

~~~
saturdaysaint
"it's a machine learning company with big data built into its DNA"

Is that really an overwhelming advantage? On the one hand, "data" definitely
helped Google build solid speech recognition, on the other, Google has shown
us time and time again that big data isn't an advantage in creating graphical
user interfaces. My sense is that the problems in an AI interface involve just
as much design and interface expertise as they do data expertise.

~~~
felipehummel
Siri has pretty much no interface. The AI/data part of the problem is much,
much harder.

~~~
notjoeflynn
The way Siri converses & jokes with the user is the interface. Not all
interfaces are graphical.

~~~
felipehummel
saturdaysaint said GUI.

~~~
saturdaysaint
I mentioned GUI as an example of an analogous domain where Google's strengths
weren't necessarily of any advantage.

------
sambeau
_"It’s wise of Google to quickly develop its own Siri rival"_

I totally disagree. The worst thing Google could do is quickly develop a copy-
cat.

Google should slowly and carefully evaluate whether they need a Siri rival and
then create something that their customers will use that enhances their core
services.

~~~
cookiecaper
To be fair it's not like Google has never done anything with voice before and
saw this Siri thing and panicked and rushed to put out an equivalent. Google
has been working to improve voice recognition for _years_ , and Android
already has significant voice features built-in (speech-to-text text input,
Voice Dialer, Voice Search). Google has been exploring this field for a long
time.

It's not crazy to package things in a way that's comparable to your
competitors.

~~~
Torn
Don't forget google is sitting on probably the world's largest repository of
video it can datamine and train speech on.

~~~
jgw
That raises an interesting question. Does voice recognition need to be
tailored to the type of lossy encoding used? Since perceptual encoders are
designed to capture what the human ear thinks it hears, rather than what the
sound wave actually looks like, does an algorithm trained on one perceptual
encoder apply well to material encoded with another?

------
VonLipwig
> Apple: _Takes risk, makes iPhone_ > Google: I want some of that. Android Go!
> > Apple: _Takes risk, launches iPad_ > Google: I want some of that. Android
> is tablet optimised > Apple: _Lets innovate here and add Siri_ > Google:
> Voice? To control a phone? Lets do that!

It probably isn't like this at all but this is how it comes across. It seems
that when Apple innovates, Google copies.

Bringing out your own version of _insert item here_ is fine but it would be
nice if Google didn't come across as plainly copying someone else. Apple has
Siri, 3 month's later: "Introducing Siri for Android! I mean Majel!"

Would be nice if the next version of Android has its own killer feature people
could shout about instead of waiting for someone else to invent it first.

~~~
mayanksinghal
As is pointed out in another comment here, Google has been working on Voice
recognition for a long time now and had voice commands prior to Siri. It was
not conversational like Siri, that was mentioned int the article as well - but
to have a conversational AI is not something new either (there are probably
hundreds of these).

Secondly, voice recognition and conversational AI is not a new product that
was _invented_ by Apple. You seem to overestimate the importance of Siri in
terms of the originality it brings. It indeed seems awesome to have and
interact with, I have not done that yet. I have an Android, and I am not even
waiting for something similar because I find it unnecessary to have one and it
might be intrusive to use in presence of others. So probably for the few who
are like me, it is not a killer feature - not even close.

~~~
VonLipwig
I was aware that Apple didn't invent Siri. They brought the company which made
it then tidied it up. The point still is that Apple recognised its use in one
of their products, they took the punt and made it happen.

I am also an Android user. This feature isn't something I need.

Like I said in my original post, it probably isn't how it seems. The fact
remains though that Apple saw an opportunity with voice commands on its mobile
platform. Google may have been working on voice technology before hand but was
it for Android?

Google is doing great on other things. Chrome, Chromebooks (maybe released a
few years too early but they took a risk on it) and driverless cars.

With Android, I have yet to see it really innovate by itself. I should say
that I do not follow Android development. I am just an Android user who
casually looks at an iPhone from time to time to compare the two.

~~~
prodigal_erik
They didn't merely tidy it up, they added hardware support and needlessly
_broke_ the version people already had that worked without it.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3215420>

------
redcap
For those who aren't aware, and it wasn't stated clearly in the article, Majel
is for Majel Barret-Roddenberry, who among other Star Trek roles was the voice
of the computer throughout the series [1]

That's what the article means by the Star Trek link.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majel_Barrett>

~~~
makmanalp
Cool reason but bad branding. How do I pronounce it? Mah-gel? May-jill? Then
again, I guess they succeeded in making "Google" a household name ...

~~~
freehunter
I hate trying to enunciate Google over a cell phone. I hate it with a passion.

But Siri isn't much better. "Sir-ei"? "Seer-e"? "Sir-eh"?

------
kurtvarner
"In other words, don’t expect the Android equivalent to have any of Siri’s
cheekiness."

Google, don't be boring.

~~~
waterlesscloud
Let's see if they even call it Majel.

------
swalsh
This is very exciting. Apple may have gotten to the market first, but Google
has proven themselves to be an AI company at the core. They have have a pretty
good head start on some more complex intelligent tasks (Image search for
example via google goggles). It's not hard to see them surpassing Siri in
quality.

Additionally combining that with an open source platform such as android, the
possibilities for what this could do really open up excite me. Google TV could
be voice controlled "Can you record chuck tonight?". You can be standing in
the kitchen talking to your house computer "what was the next step in this
recipe?". The real power is you're not constrained to just your phone or
tablet.

------
hahainternet
I would rather Google didn't work on this. If anything they need to

a) Improve the default TTS voice so it does not sound as jarring

b) Include intent based inter-operation with apps

Ideally Google will provide only the services they do already, with mapping
and searching, but will allow people to easily hook in and provide the rest.

I also tend to think that voice activation is mostly a gimmick outside of
being in the car, and Vlingo already works excellently with a 'Hey Vlingo'
realtime trigger.

~~~
vidarh
Vlingo doesn't understand a single word I've tried saying to it (I have a
Scandinavian accent), so while I don't really see myself using this stuff
much, Vlingo is a non-starter unless it's recognition gets vastly better. I
wonder how large a part of the potential user base it has problems handling.

~~~
michaelcampbell
Out of curiosity have you tried Siri, and if so does it do any better? I've
often wondered how well it worked on non-Midwestern-UnitedStates accents.

------
easyfrag
Apple makes most of its money by selling hardware, Google's main income comes
from advertising.

Let's assume Majel equals or surpasses Siri, this would be a clear benefit to
users. But how does this benefit Google? Siri can answer questions (using
partners) without using a search engine, yes it's a limited use right now but
surely that functionality will grow.

The million dollar question is how does Google make money with Majel?

~~~
rudiger
I'm sure Google can come up with interesting ways to advertise through Majel.
They'll probably use the unique voice data to profile users and target ads
even more effectively.

------
wslh
I would love to finally see voice web browsing. The TTS and VR quality is the
main issue. I've written an HN voice navigation and article reading but the
.NET TTS is far from good.

~~~
nextparadigms
Google's "Phonetic Arts" TTS engine sounds a lot better don't you think? It
seems pretty natural to me. Go ahead and try a Google Translate from English
to Spanish, or the other way around.

~~~
wslh
It's better but not Siri.

------
Havoc
I thought Google was terrified of this because its no good for injecting ads?

------
falling
I'm sure Google will have something different than just a Siri clone, since
apparently they thought it is a bad idea [http://gigaom.com/apple/googles-
andy-rubin-doesnt-think-siri...](http://gigaom.com/apple/googles-andy-rubin-
doesnt-think-siri-makes-a-good-friend/)

------
funkah
22 Siri "clones" come out every week. Consider me underwhelmed.

~~~
spydertennis
examples?

------
marshallp
The article gets it all wrong. The technology siri is based on was only a
project for a few years and ended in 2005, basically because it was a failure
and already far behind search engines at the time.

The majel thing is likely far more than siri, rumors are that it gives 93%
accuracy on the turing test, and includes emotion and object detection
technology.

~~~
gjm11
What on earth is "93% accuracy on the turing test" meant to mean? Do you know
what the Turing test actually is?

~~~
marshallp
What are you talking about?

You can look up the turing test on wikipedia.

I'm talking about the reddit leak by a former google x lab member. See this
page for more. <http://www.artificialbrains.com/google-x-lab>

------
Shivetya
Majel's voice would be awesome... there is a crapton of good voices to choose
from and some can be recreated. We have HAL and SAL. My personal favorite used
to be the lady who did the voice overs for Mechwarrior 2.

Still I am not sure I want to live in a world of devices blurting out
everything I ask about or others. I already tire of people who use their
phones walkie talkie style.

