“With iOS 7, Apple has not only made its Siri virtual assistant smarter, but has managed to further distance itself from Android maker Google by turning to Microsoft’s Bing as the service’s default search engine,” AppleInsider reports.
“When Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue took the stage at WWDC on Monday, he spared no time getting into the enhancements iOS 7 will bring to Siri, including deeper device integration, a wider range of source and, notably, a reliance on Microsoft’s Bing,” AppleInsider reports. “A number of Internet services are set to be integrated alongside existing Siri capabilities, including Twitter, Wikipedia and, perhaps most importantly, Bing Web search. Over Siri’s lifetime, the service relied only on Google for Internet searches, but in iOS 7, the assistant will pull from Microsoft’s servers as default.”
MacDailyNews Take: All that’s left to do is to remove Google as Safari’s default search engine.
AppleInsider reports, “Another feature noted at Apple’s event was the substantial changes made to Siri’s voice capabilities… In iOS 7, Siri’s voice has been updated, and if Monday’s demonstration is any indication, very closely mimics true speech.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Listen, we hate Microsoft as much as the next guys (okay, more; much, much, much more), but even we choose to use Bing over Google for certain things – like Bing Maps’ Bird’s Eye view, for one example. We’re still 100% Microsoft free here, and we don’t need to use Bing for anything, but the fact that we choose to do so for some things should speak volumes. Plus, anything that lessens Google’s stifling influence over online search is a Good Thing™, even if it happens to come from Microsoft.
Total dominance of anything, even if it’s from Apple, is just a Bad Thing™. It leads to stagnation and all sorts of other unappetizing consequences.
Also, of course, if you haven’t already, try DuckDuckGo! Safari users can easily add the DuckDuckGo Safari plugin by following the simple instructions here.
Google’s going to rue the day they got greedy by deciding to try to work against Apple instead of with them. – MacDailyNews Take, March 09, 2010
