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Siri, What Time Is It in London?

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Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#561

Post by reaperducer »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #523

Siri doesn't know that my front door is called "FRONT DOOR". I only have one smart lock, which works perfectly, and it is called "FRONT DOOR" in HomeKit. When I ask Siri about my FRONT DOOR she responds that she cannot find it. When I ask Siri about the status of my DOOR, she responds with "The FRONT DOOR is locked/unlocked". I'll then say 'Alright Siri you literally just used the phrase "FRONT DOOR" five seconds ago…

About once a week Siri and I have this conversation:

Me: "Siri, turn off the bedroom lights."

Siri: "OK. Your 6am alarm is off."

For the most part Siri works for me, with the exception of the above and her insistence on adding "ginger ale" to my grocery list as two items.

/Native English speaker, specifically trained in non-regional diction because I used to work on-air in radio.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#562

Post by markkat »

parliament32 wrote: post #487
markkat wrote: post #485

The mistake Gruber is making here is that DDG, Google, Alexa, and Bing did not "get it right". Their answer wasn't wrong, but it's not because they "got it". They never "got it" any more than Siri didn't. AI is a story we tell ourselves.

Of course they "got it". When any human says a context-less "London", except maybe people literally in London ON and surrounding areas, they obviously mean the London. It's a little human communication nuance but understanding "what I mean" vs bare "what I say" is a huge part of getting AI-ish assistants to be useful.

Google, DDG, Alexa, and Bing don't "get it", meaning they don't shared a contextual framework that resembles our own. These algorithms mimic a shared contextual framework, but it is mimicry. That is the fundamental reason why they don't know how they are wrong when we decide they are.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#563

Post by kempbellt »

>If you had a human assistant and asked them “What’s the time in London?” and they honestly thought the best way to answer that question was to give you the time for the nearest London, which happened to be in Ontario or Kentucky, you’d fire that assistant.

An obvious sign that you would be a shit employer to work for. OP is probably exaggerating here (at least I hope so), but if you were to fire someone over this without educating them in the ways of how your mind works to create better efficacy between you two, then you don't deserve employees.

Context...means...everything. People make the most basic of mistakes all the time. Teach them the preferred outcome, and move on. Making a fuss over it shows your lack of maturity and ability to lead anyone.

Reminds me of kids who are in the "in" making of kids who aren't. "What??? You've never seen Star Wars??? GUYS! Timmy's never seen Star Wars! I bet he doesn't even know who Obi Wan is. What an idiot..."

smh...

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#564

Post by OrangeMango »

Youden wrote: post #291
ojilles wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best are that have a settings page where they try to give an example. But use a day-of-month =< 12. Like your example. It couldn't have hurt to use and example of "22/05/2020"; then it is still infuriating, but clear.

> It couldn't have hurt to use and example of "22/05/2020"; then it is still infuriating, but clear. Assuming you're addressing OP with this part, I think that was their point. When an application presents you with "04/05/2020", you have no way of knowing whether it means crazy American dates or normal-people dates.

> "04/05/2020", you have no way of knowing whether it means crazy American dates

In just about every professional setting I've been in (in the US), Americans are just as confused as everyone else. We deal with people and documents/data from the entire world too. We look for clues elsewhere, such as other dates from the same source that have any number greater than 12, etc. There are very few documents these days where you be 100% confident without some other confirmation.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#565

Post by [deleted] »

OriginalPenguin wrote: post #521
_ps6d wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My address has been blatantly broken in Google Maps for years now. When you enter it, for some reason it deletes the house number and just looks up the street, which ends up pointing to somewhere about a 10 minute drive away. For example, if my address was "123 Elm Street" it just ignores the "123" and searches for "Elm Street" instead. We have to give special instructions all the time to delivery drivers and other p…

Ironically your best bet to get it fixed is almost certainly to post your real address here as part of this thread.

[deleted]

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#566

Post by kempbellt »

jvolkman wrote: post #357

At some point about a year ago I noticed that I could no longer ask my Google Home devices "what's the weather?". I'd just get a generic "I don't understand" response. But more specific queries such as "What's the weather in Seattle?" would work. After a couple of weeks of this, I somehow got the idea that it was related to the devices' configured locations. And sure enough, telling the Home that I lived in the next…

What if you asked Google "what's the weather?" and it gave you a dictionary response of "weather" as an answer? Or with more snark, responded with, "I don't know. Look outside".

"What is the weather report for today/this week?" is a more accurate question, despite an annoying amount of verbosity. But answers are still given relatively. "Cloudy" could be an accurate answer, for now. But it will be "Sunny" this afternoon.

Some people will prefer a one word answer to "What's the weather?". Others, will want an hourly breakdown of the day displayed on their screen. Others, might prefer a week. It's hard to give an ideal response for every situation.

Ironically, if I say "Hey Siri, weather" I usually get what I need.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#567

Post by samcheng »

quicklime wrote: post #520
Slartie wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the person asking the question lives in Ohio, they may actually be talking about London OH (or Dublin OH). I would seriously doubt this assumption. Why on earth should someone living in a state specifically ask for the local time in a different location within that same state? On the contrary, this context information would make it much more likely that the person actually meant "London, England". Except if ther…

Flipping this around a bit: if someone in England asked "what's the time in London?" should Siri assume that they're talking about London in Ohio or Ontario? Everyone in England is on GMT, so they don't need to do timezone conversions to London time.

I'd expect it to ask the first time around, and then remember the answer afterwards.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#568

Post by p1mrx »

OriginalPenguin wrote: post #521
_ps6d wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My address has been blatantly broken in Google Maps for years now. When you enter it, for some reason it deletes the house number and just looks up the street, which ends up pointing to somewhere about a 10 minute drive away. For example, if my address was "123 Elm Street" it just ignores the "123" and searches for "Elm Street" instead. We have to give special instructions all the time to delivery drivers and other p…

Ironically your best bet to get it fixed is almost certainly to post your real address here as part of this thread.

Or post another address with the same problem, assuming it affects the entire street.

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#569

Post by kstrauser »

austinl wrote: post #546

I've returned to manually calling people manually from the Contacts app because of how frustrated I'd get every time I'd try to make a phone call through Siri. The whole exchange takes about 20 seconds: "Hey Siri, call John Smith" Siri: "Did you mean John Smith?" "Yes John Smith" Siri: "Calling John Smith"...

I had a boss, Joe Chan. My wife is Jen. A nonzero portion of the time, I'd say something like "Hey Siri, text Jen I love you" and would get back "OK, texting Joe Chan I love you".

I've texted Joe approximately never. I've texted my wife 8 times this morning. If there was any ambiguity at all, could you, uh, optimize for the contact I actually contact?

Re: Siri, What Time Is It in London?

#570

Post by madeofpalk »

empath75 wrote: post #121
madeofpalk wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no point in asking it questions or talking to it for anything but changing volume and setting timers. A smart speaker this is not. For what it’s worth, that’s what anyone uses any “smart speaker” or assistant for. Settings timers/alarms, asking for the weather, and maybe starting music. Whether Siri is capable of more is a good question, but people don’t use them for any more.

They only use them for that because it sucks at everything else.

I'm talking about all 'digital assistants' - Google's and Amazons. All people use them for is timers and weather.
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