Is the sudden rush by Apple to improve Siri's language understanding after all these years anything to do with the impending release of Cortana?
Devs: Fancy a job teaching Siri to speak the Queen's English?
Apple looks set to give Siri a few language lessons after advertising for experts in a variety of hitherto non-fruity dialects. According to its job listings, Apple is looking to employ a number of Siri language engineers to help roll out its personal assistant across the world. "Come and join the team that teaches Siri how …
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Friday 27th June 2014 06:30 GMT Anonymous Coward
A quick question.. why would Tagalog be "very weird" or any "weirder" than Thai for example?
Both from a marketing perspective (the smart phone market is about the same size in both countries) or from a linguistic one these two examples are just as "weird" or "normal" depending how you want to look at it.
Simple fact checking could avoid such bumpkin racial/cultural misconceptions creeping in !
Or poke fun at things closer to home... try Siri in Welsh, Gaelic or Jordie for weird.
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Friday 27th June 2014 12:18 GMT fridaynightsmoke
Geordie LaForge
I think they missed a trick there; they started with the Chief Engineer being Scottie on TOS, then they should have had an actual Geordie (complete with wye aye, etc) on TNG, and continue working their way south with each series, something like Scotty, Geordie, Yorkie, Brummy and Cockney. All being massively stereotypical, obviously.
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Friday 27th June 2014 12:49 GMT fridaynightsmoke
Re: Don't forget...
Yamyam translation guide: Commonly confused words and phrases
Canapés: The small spherical seeds of the pod fruit Pisum sativum, sometimes in a mushy form, supplied canned.
Warrduno: I am afraid that I do not possess that knowledge, or, this situation is dissatisfactory.
Day: Did not.
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Friday 27th June 2014 16:16 GMT Kubla Cant
Re: "this writer's Apple Map app has started giving directions in a Welsh accent"
I've had difficulty with anglophone satnavs - both Android and Garmin - when driving in Italy. All the names get an English pronunciation. "Viale Doglie", for example came out more like "vile doglead". Some of the more polysyllabic Italian names required so much re-interpretation that I missed the turning.
It must be much worse in languages with more complicated pronunciation rules than Italian. If I go to Belgium, I wonder if it will give me directions to Wipers?
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Friday 27th June 2014 20:44 GMT Anonymous Coward
There's a story about an American..
who, whilst visiting the UK, regaled listeners with his misadventures in the quaint little town
of, as he pronounced it, Loogieburoogie...
(I leave it up to you, dear readers, to figure out where that is).
Seriously, I'm waiting for the day Siri can handle any Scottish or Irish accent with any degree of competence, let alone handling some of the more, ahem, quirky dialectial issues..
[Obligatory Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAz_UvnUeuU]
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Saturday 28th June 2014 15:24 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: figure out where that is
Aye.
It was only years later I found out that this was a common mispronunciation.
This guy was from O'Fallon, Mo, worked for a large US medical supplies company, we told him he should visit that well known Scottish town Mulguy whilst he was up here peddling his wares.
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