Rush Limbaugh: You won’t believe what my iPhone 4S did in the car this morning

220 Comments

Mac, iPhone, and iPad user Rush Limbaugh yesterday discussed his iPhone 4S and Siri, since its inception on August 1, 1988, is the highest-rated talk radio show in the United States. The 3-hour Rush Limbaugh Show airs daily on a network of approximately 590 AM and FM affiliate stations. The program is also broadcast worldwide on the U.S. Armed Forces Radio Network. A November 2008 poll by Zogby International found that Rush Limbaugh was the most trusted news personality in the nation.

From the live transcript, Limbaugh said:

Now, if there is anybody in this audience listening that writes for an Apple or high-tech blog — or if there is anybody listening to this program that works for or at Apple, Incorporated — you have to hear what happened to me this morning. Sadly, I can’t prove it. (interruption) Well, you’ll hear why in a moment. I was so discombobulated by what happened that I didn’t save what showed up on my iPhone. Now, let me describe my setup for you. I have a car that has a Bluetooth mating system in it. So my iPhone is paired with the Bluetooth system, which means that I can use hands-free operation. Everybody does this, probably. No big deal there.

I also drive around with a Verizon LTE hotspot because Verizon’s turned on LTE here which is 20 megabytes down. So I don’t use AT&T’s 4G, I don’t use cellular when I’m driving around. I use Wi-Fi. This hotspot from Verizon converts the LTE signal to Wi-Fi and that’s how I connect the iPhone. So my system is my phone paired with the car’s Bluetooth provided by the manufacturer, and it is also connected via Wi-Fi to a Verizon LTE hotspot. Now, the way Apple iPhone dictation works is you hit the microphone button on your keyboard, and that immediately establishes an online connection with Apple servers somewhere.

The dictation does not occur, the translation does not occur in the phone. What you say is transmitted at whatever connection speed you’re using — 3G, 4G, or Wi-Fi — to Apple servers wherever they are. The speech is then transcribed to text by a company called Nuance, which makes Dragon Dictation, and that’s the voice-to-text aspect of Siri in the iPhone. So you say, “Testing one, two, three” and hit the microphone button. Apple’s servers then transcribe it and send it back to you, and it displays on your screen. This happens fast if you have a fast connection. That’s why I use the LTE hotspot. This happens within a second and a half. What I’ve said shows back up on my iPhone or iPad a second and a half after I say it.

Now, the way my Bluetooth setup in the car works is — if I’m listening to the radio, for example — the moment I hit the microphone on the iPhone, the radio is muted, because a phone call is being made, essentially. The phone system via Bluetooth is used to send my voice transcription out to Apple and back. When it comes back and the connection is finished, then the audio from the radio resumes. Up until today, it worked flawlessly. The dictation, sometimes it’s a 100% accurate, sometimes 95%. It’s always close enough to just go ahead and hit the send button, except sometimes it doesn’t get proper names right. Today after the hotspot established its connection with the iPhone and I got Wi-Fi going and everything’s hunky-dory.

I’m maybe a quarter of a mile from home on the way in to work, I attempt dictation, and nothing happens. I hit the microphone button and I get the three beeps and no connection. It’s not working. So I say, “Ah, damn it, the system’s down. Something’s wrong with the servers,” but I keep trying. The third attempt… I was trying to respond to some stuff Kathryn had sent me. She needed an answer on some stuff. So I said whatever it was my answer was the third time, and what came back to me? This is what you’re not gonna believe. What showed up on my iPhone was “Obama’s minions are taking over and there’s nothing you can do about it,” and I hadn’t said anything like that!

The audio on the radio did not un-mute. The audio on the radio never came back. The whole system was discombobulated. So I switched from satellite to AM just to see if there was something wrong with the satellite signal, and AM came in fine. So I tried it again. I deleted that. I did not save that. I thought, “Man, something’s really not right.” So I responded to Kathryn again. I don’t even remember what it was saying. I was answering questions about some stuff we’ve got going on this weekend. I said it again, the same thing I’d said the first time.

What came back to me the second time was totally unrelated to anything I had said. It was talking about wind power and Obama and, “You don’t have a chance.” I am not making this up. And I said to myself, “You know, somebody’s hacked Apple’s servers. I’m gonna get in there.” I said, “I can’t wait to get to work and fire up some of these Apple blogs because I’ll bet you this has been going on all morning and I’ll betcha it’s a big story that Apple’s servers have been hacked.” So I tried it again. The third thing which came back had nothing to do with politics.

It had nothing to do with Obama, but it was not anything close to what I had said. Then I started doing, “Testing one, two, three,” and I would get back four sentences that did not have “testing” or “one, two, three” in them. So, as I say, I didn’t save any of these. I wasn’t thinking. I was so curious. I didn’t send them. It didn’t make any sense. If I would have sent these things to Kathryn, she would have thought I’m losing my mind even more than I already have. (interruption) Wait, I’m not through with the story! So I get here. This happens two more times. I get here, the first thing I do when I get into the studio on our network system is start dictating, and it’s flawless. It’s perfect.

It was only in my car that this happened. It was only with my Verizon LTE hotspot and my Bluetooth. I got in here and I used our Wi-Fi network, and dictation worked perfectly. It’s been working perfectly all morning. It was only in the car. I got so busy, I didn’t have a chance to go back out to the car and try it again. I’ll try it later when I leave. So I sent this story. I typed this story I just told you and I sent it to a bunch of computer people. I said, “What could possibly explain this?” And the answers I got back ranged from, “You’ve been hacked,” to, “Somebody got into your car,” to, “Somebody’s tampered with the Bluetooth module.”

It was, “Somebody’s done something. They’re sending you a message that they can do it,” or, “Your Bluetooth module is so totally defective that you need a new one,” or, “There’s something wrong with the LTE hotspot.” There was no answer that was satisfactory. This has never happened. But that first message that came back was: “Obama’s minions are taking over.” As I say, I can’t prove this, because I didn’t keep the transcriptions. I deleted them. I don’t even know if I actually deleted them. I just didn’t send them. (They are not on the phone. I went and looked.) So when I finish here this afternoon and am on the way out, I’m gonna try this again.

I haven’t changed any circumstances. I’m not charging the hotspot. I’m not gonna switch out the Bluetooth unit. I’m not gonna change. What I might do turn is off the hotspot if it happens again or just use the AT&T 4G and see if it happens that way. But to understand this again: When you use dictation on your iPhone or iPad, the phone is not doing anything. What you get is transmitted to Apple’s servers and then there’s software on those servers made by Nuance, which does the voice translation to text. And that gets sent back to your phone, in whatever application you’re using: E-mail, message. Whatever has a keyboard, you can use dictation. So what do you think of that, Snerdley? Who could possibly explain this?

Could it be that somebody at Apple can ID my phone, knows when I’m voice transcribing and can send something back? Could that possibly be? Who knows? I have no idea. I am not a power user. In the sense… I mean, I’m probably a consumer power user, but I’m not a power user in terms of people that can use a terminal, write code, and all that kind of stuff. I haven’t gotten into it that much. I don’t have any other theories, but I sent this off to two people who might, and none of them could believe it but they then started trying to explain it to me what various things could exist to explain this. But it was the first two that came back that specifically mentioned Obama.

So there’s that. (interruption) The Martins didn’t hack anybody! Snerdley just asked me… That grandfather and grandmother couple, they were driving around in I think either Tampa or Jacksonville somewhere. And like everybody, they had a cell phone radio in their Cadillac. They were able to monitor cell phone calls. Like a police scanner, theirs monitored cell signals and frequencies, and they overheard Newt having a conversation with John Boehner back in the nineties. And this grand-couple, big Democrat activists, thought that they were in on history. And they recorded it, too! They had a recorder in their car along with the cell phone radio in their car, and they recorded it. And they sent it to the New York Times, who published it. But they didn’t hack anything.

They just had a radio that was able to monitor those frequencies. Well, I know that was years ago. It was like 20 years ago when that happened, and they’ve upgraded. But the first thing I thought of was somebody hacked Apple’s servers. Because it’s impossible for dictate — for example, if you have Dragon dictate on your iPhone or your iPad, the hardware, software inside the phone is not doing the voice-to-text translation. That’s happening off-site via servers and comes back to your phone via the network. ID’d by phone number, e-mail address, with the iMessage program you can set up five different e-mail addresses that people can reach you on. But in this case it would be IP, because this is Wi-Fi. This could be a combination phone number and IP address. Who knows. As I say, I’m not that much of a power user to be able to explain that, but this didn’t happen yesterday when I parked the car in the garage. The only thing that happened to the car yesterday was it got washed, at home.

Now, I was in the library most of the night working. Somebody coulda come in, got the car, drove it somewhere, I would never know. The garage is about a half mile from my library. Just kidding. But I didn’t check the security camera, so I don’t know if anything happened to the car. I don’t know if it left the garage and came back, I don’t know. I have no clue. And of course, if I start asking, I know the answer I’m going to get. No, no, didn’t touch it. But the most common suggestion I got from the people I sent it to was, “You’ve got a Bluetooth problem here. There’s something wrong with Bluetooth.” That may be, but for Obama and his minions to end up in a translated voice-to-text message when I didn’t say Obama, I didn’t say minions, I didn’t say anything about any of that, the dictation’s never been that far off. I don’t take super-secret phone calls. That’s the point. This wasn’t super-secret. It was just to Kathryn. It happens all the time.

If it happens this afternoon I’m gonna keep whatever it throws back at me. I won’t be able to prove what I say, you know, that’s lost to the ether, but I will be able to show whatever it thinks I said in terms of the translation that comes back.

Source: RushLimbaugh.com

MacDailyNews Take: Any ideas? Could whatever’s on Limbaugh’s iPod (sometimes vehicles default to iPod when plugged in) or satellite radio be playing and that is what Siri is “hearing,” instead of the microphone? Is it some sort of latency issue? Is it switching between the Wi-Fi and the iPhone’s cellular connection? Is Siri mixing up deliveries between users? Has anything similar happened to you?

[Thanks to MacDailyNews readers too numerous to mention individually for the heads up.]

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220 Comments

      1. Maobama. See, I might take the step of researching your unrelated-the-current-topic information, but you sort of lose credibility when you use these unclever nicknames for the President of the United States.

        I’m sure whatever you’re referring to would have been extensively and exhaustively covered by Fox News if there were any merit to it. (and right now you’re thinking I’m a raging liberal, and I’m not. I’m just not a political extremist).

        Reply

        1. You have zero credibility whatsoever.

          I’m sure whatever you’re referring to would have been extensively and exhaustively covered by PMSNBC-NYSLIMES Propaganda outlets if there were any merit to it. And you are a raging LibTARD.

        2. If by that you mean Limbaugh’s past addiction to pain killers and illegally obtained scripts, it was well documented by every major news outlet at the time.

          I was joking about Limbaugh taking the meds — but somehow your proclivity for name-calling smacks of hatred. Unless the words “maobama” and “libtard” are meant to crack us all up (in which case your sense of humor just needs a little work).

          I voted for more Republicans than Democrats in the last election, BTW. Though the best man or woman did get the nod from me.

  6. The company that distributes Rush Limpaugh (Premiere Networks) is part of the Clear Channel empire which just so happens to have ben bought out by Bain Capital by LBO in 2008. That would be the Bain Capital that used to be headed by Willard “Mitt’ RawMoney.

    In many markets where Clear Channel operates multiple talk stations Limpaugh is simulcast on multiple stations (as many as 5 at one time) – roadblocking the time slot against any other competition. So spare us the boilerplate about how many stations he is on.

    Take a look at his demographics- they skew poor, rural, poorly educated, older and white. Not exactly the demographic of America’s future which is urban, more educated, younger and of color.

    As to what America’s most highly paid drug addict said, he sounds like he’s off his meds. We know he self medicated with Oxycontin until he became deaf then lied to his listeners about an auto-immune condition and had cochlear implants. He also compelled his housekeeper to doctor shop to supply his habit- something that is a felony. So much for law and order or Rush would be somebody’s b*tch in the Florida State Pen instead of a useful idiot pimping Republican talking points on the bought and paid for public airwaves.

    Reply

    1. That was a weird post provocateur, but I suppose it was provocative 😉 I’m not a Limbaugh fan, but he is very popular, even among some of my more conservative friends of color, and they are not poor, rural poorly educated or old. You are big into stereotypes I see… I’m a libertarian. People have the right to listen to what they want. You have a right to turn it off, so don’t let him get under your skin so much. Sounds like you are giving him control. Obsession maybe? The point is MDN got you to bite and to comment. There is nothing like hot hits to your website. Carry on 😉

      Reply

  9. Despite what anyone thinks of Rush Limbaugh, the story is interesting enough to warrant a read. I would be just as curious if Al Sharpton had been talking about it 😉 Is there a “Siri Reality Distortion” Website somewhere collecting this stuff?

    Reply

  12. Wow. Regardless of who said it, such a story seems possible, especially in his case because of his social position. There’s no way to be sure that someone in the right place with the knowledge couldn’t cause something like that. I’m inclined to think it’s likely not apple personel but someone else somewhere in between. I don’t trust iMessage and iCloud entirely. I think there’s unintended problems that can occur which no one may know about. We don’t know the full details of the system. Maybe apple stores the comments and sent him back one he said earlier. I’ve personally seen iMessages show up then disappear, all within the context and order of the conversation. That’s happened to me several times. It just did today. But today the comment came back and was inserted where it was originally. I never saw that happen in all the years of text messaging.

    Reply

  14. People that speak out of their butt about Rush usually have never listened to his show. He is no bigot or raciest. He usues hyperbole to make his points.

    If you actually listen to Rush, you would be better informed.

    Reply

  16. I remember this guy made headlines around the world for calling women who want free contraception sluts (contraception is free to everyone in the UK). On that basis I couldn’t care less what stories he makes up about Siri.

    Reply

    1. The woman was a demoTARD operative sent to a college to try to make waves. A complete set up. And we do not need to pay for her birth control. Parasite.

      That’s the reason the UK is so screwed up. You idiot socialists have destroyed your country!

      Reply

  17. Why would MDN want to have anything to do with Limbaugh. He may use Apple products, but that doesn’t exonerate his sexiest, misogynistic and fascist rantings.

    Anyway, shouldn’t he be concentrating on driving carefully rather than fiddling with technology while behind the wheel?

    Reply

      1. I’m certainly not racist – I employ a team of wonderful people from all over the world with many different ethnic origins. And I love them all. We work on a strictly profit-sharing basis.

        I don’t think you understand what the word ‘racist means’.

        The fact that ‘you conservatives’ hate me? Well, I take that as a compliment.

        Reply

        3. Did I say I was a liberal? I think that’s your (crass) assumption.

          But do tell us all here at MDN … “If I’m a liberal, I’m a racist” – what does that actually mean? On what do you base that assumption? I so want to understand what the hell you’re talking about.

        6. So, to all you gun-toting fascists who write here on the MDN website …

          When Steve Jobs talked about Apple being at the Intersection of Liberal Arts and Technology …

          And you say you don’t like Liberals and what they stand for … why do you bother posting here?

  18. MDN – keep your MF politics to yourself.

    Rush Limbaugh was scoring illegal drugs (http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/crime/warrants-detail-rush-limbaughs-drug-use) off the street for years from his immigrant maid, while railing against drug addicts. He also travels abroad to pork (pun very intended) prostitutes abroad: http://www.alternet.org/story/38192/ while railing against the foes of “family values.”

    Who give shit about whether or not this bloated, addicted, misogynistic, hypocritical pig likes Apple products or not?

    PS: The field above that says “web” above should say “email address”

    Reply

    1. Hey Bor,

      And your president was doing Cocaine and god knows what else in his hidden past.

      He has racked up more debt than all previous presidents ever in just 3 years.

      He hates the US and is out to take it to it’s knees.

      We will vote his pathetic ass out this November if he isn’t impeached before.

      Reply

  19. I don’t know a lot about this guy (other than the ‘slut’ comment) but he seems to be an obese smoker with a drug problem. Let’s hope he loses his job and all his money (probably by being sued) and then can’t afford health care to cure his diabetes/ heart disease/ lung cancer.

    Reply

      1. Demotard, how clever! Could you even find the UK on a map? How about your own country? Give up, eat some more junk and get even fatter, then grab your gun and go out and shoot some kids or black people – it’s the American dream. Half the world hates you, the other half just thinks you’re all idiots. Nobody could really care less what goes on over there, but if the Republicans get into power then you’ll be nuked so none if it will have mattered.

        Reply

        1. Yes I’ve been there many times. A great place to visit but a socialist hell hole otherwise. Nice job your “socialized” healthcare does on your population’s teeth. I noticed some serious mutants walking around in London too. Way worse than NYC. Looked like night of the living dead at times.

          I have relatives from the UK and they hate the socialism too you freaking idiot.

          So shove it where the sun don’t shine limey boy.

          And we hate more than the half the hell hole world and could give a rats ass what you pathetic losers think of us. George Washington has been voted the UK’s most arch enemy of all time. He schooled you red coat pussies.

          The democrat Parasites in the US are trying to downgrade the US to your pathetic standards of living. Hows your shower, refrigerator, dish washer, etc doing. Do you have any of those? How’s your clown car doing that they force you to drive around in. Crumples up like a tin can on impact. How’s all the video surveillance going? How are your soccer hooligans doing. You’re probably one of them you scum sucker.

          You’re the laughing stock of your beloved EU which sucks too. Nice socialist hell they’ve created with the bankrupt EU. One of Maobama’s many horrible role models…… Go to Hell Mark.

        3. I’ve spent a lot of time in the UK and the people there remind of the fatties on the space ship in WALL-E. Gross. I don’t know how they eat the slop they serve over there either. The UK is definitely not known for it’s cuisine. Disgusting.

      1. Ahhh… there’s a Dittohead chiming in now with typical Limbaugh divisiveness & ignorance.

        Just because I call out MDN & your hero, doesn’t mean I’m a Democrat or fan or Rachel Maddow. Simpletons who listen to the pill-popping bigot make that mistake often.

        Reply

  22. Wow, whenever Rush is mentioned a whole bunch of dodos here go apeshit, want to reopen gas chambers and other goody stuff like that.

    Just wow, he must be really hitting a nerve.

    Reply

  25. The right wing yanks come across really well on here don’t they? I love Americans. You all shovel fatty junk into your mouths until you’re so fat you can’t move, carry guns so you can run into schools and shoot kids or just any black guy that gets near your gated community, you never leave your own country and couldn’t find it on a map and you actually think creationalism should be tought alongside science! What a country of fat racist violent idiots!

    Reply

    1. Yes, look at all the UK and Aussie papers. A bunch of fat, drunk, crooked, tooth Socialists. Losers. Good thing you have the US to protect your sorry asses.

      Wasn’t that European from Norway the one going on a killing spree with guns you troll.

      Go crawl back under your rock in whatever hell hole country you take up space in you parasite.

      Reply

      1. Haha, calm down fatty, just playing you at your own game. And the Norweigan was a right wing faschist just like you. Impressed you know that Norway is in Europe though, well done.

        Reply

      2. Could you explain what you mean by ‘socialist’, or is it just a slogan you bandy about?

        Oh yes, and that guy (murderer) from Norway. He professes to be part of a ultra right-wing (conservative) alliance. He most definitely NOT a socialist. Maybe you have a lot in common with him? LMAO

        Reply

        1. No he professes to be a NAZI which is what all of you Lemmings are.

          The democrat party and the communist party share the same talking points.

          NAZIs were socialists.

          Liberals are Racists.

          Liberals are Clueless.

          Liberals are Parasites.

          Liberals are Haters.

        2. More unsubstatiated crap from someone who’s parents were almost certainly part of the Ku Klux Klan and Mikey boy who loves being a nasty violent little fascist too.

          No arguments, just idiot rhetoric.

          Hey dude – get an education!

          Typical fascist crap from a Yankee shithead

        3. KKK was started by Democrats you ahole. Prominent Democrat party members in the KKK too. Stuff it.

          And Libtards are always the ones losing it and going on Killing sprees in the US. 99 out of 100 times with an illegally obtained fire arm or weapon.

          So you can go F*CK yourself.

        4. cool it, OttowaMike. there is no difference between republicans and democrats, they are equally corrupt, just beholden to different funders. the liberals you speak of have no real voice in the US, and really haven’t since the Jeffersonians left office. That being said, for every evidence you dredge up about liberals being fascist, racist, hating, etc can easily be matched by a “conservative” doing the same thing. For example: the most conservative cultures on the planet today include religious idealogues who enforce their rigid ideologies via jihad. What did the US do in response? Carpet bomb Baghdad — an offensive war of choice that, no matter how it is justified, turned out to be an order of magnitude greater in pain and suffering to innocent Muslims than was inflicted by a few Saudi terrorists. Who pointed out this moral dilemma? Not a single “conservative” in the US. So stuff it with your accusations of how terrible one side is versus the other. They are both sides of the same coin.

          I assume you might support the “Conservative” party in Canada — it acts quite a bit more leftist than the paranoid US parties, both of whom think that the US must act as the world’s policeman no matter what it costs the taxpayer. I believe in strong defense, but i have a hard time swallowing the recurring drums of war and insults dripping with hatred from self-proclaimed morally superior rightists like you.

        5. Cool it yourself Mike, you commie. You are full of communist, red herring, propaganda.

          Liberalism is the root of all evil on the planet, period.

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