Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#101

Post by DrBazza » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:20 PM UTC

agotterer wrote: post #50

DrBazza wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You clearly haven't had the pleasure of trying to use voice control in a Mercedes-Benz. It makes Siri and Cortana seem telepathic by comparison.

Same with the Audi. I don’t understand why all the car companies aren’t licensing the assistant technology from the big tech companies and using it as the default. I get Siri via car play, but even car play is sandboxed because it can’t control things like the radio or temperature.

Android Auto at least works, and that in turn has voice recognition that works. It's completely "meta" that I have to use voice recognition on my phone to call a number that triggers bluetooth that activates the hands-free and speaker in the car.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#102

Post by athenot » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:20 PM UTC

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #13

This is really, really unfortunate. One of the last on-device speech companies is being bought out and moved into Microsoft's cloud division. Expect nobody to be willing to sell you speech recognition without a cloud subscription now.

Nuance has grown through acquisitions. They basically bought up technologies and slapped a common name on them. But each one retained its one oddities. So you configure one product with INI-style files, another one with XML files, a module within that one is configured with text files using configuration codes... it's a royal pain in the behind.

Hopefully Microsoft will eventually unify these apis and configurations into something coherent.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#103

Post by Grimm1 » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:20 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #84

skrowl wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Siri is especially bad when compared to Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa, both of which are light years ahead. Usual Apple reliance on their fans buying their devices no matter how bad the software is.

Isn’t it more likely that the quality of the voice assistant isn’t that important to most buyers?

Anecdata but I've never even bothered to try Siri on mine. I think you're on the money there.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#104

Post by globular-toast » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:21 PM UTC

makhmedov wrote: post #5

I think GitHub got better since the acquisition.

Got any specifics to back up that feeling?

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#105

Post by tupac_speedrap » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:22 PM UTC

traveler01 wrote: post #42

rvz wrote: post #10

Now Nuance. It seems Microsoft is still actively continuing to buy more companies and it seems Discord is still on the menu.

It's actually kinda scary to see Microsoft stretching its tentacles like this. Only this year they bought Bethesda, Nuance and there are rumours about them buying Discord and other gaming studios. Microsoft's influence is growing deeply...

Where is the antitrust lawsuit?

Microsoft got done for this before (bundling Internet Explorer with Windows) and if you look at where they are now buying out businesses and using dark patterns in Windows 10 to make people use Edge as well as implying it is a fundamental part of the OS they are way beyond was acceptable years ago.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#106

Post by rkalla » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:22 PM UTC

agotterer wrote: post #50

DrBazza wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You clearly haven't had the pleasure of trying to use voice control in a Mercedes-Benz. It makes Siri and Cortana seem telepathic by comparison.

Same with the Audi. I don’t understand why all the car companies aren’t licensing the assistant technology from the big tech companies and using it as the default. I get Siri via car play, but even car play is sandboxed because it can’t control things like the radio or temperature.

For the reason it took BMW so long to say yes to Android Auto - Amazon/Google will happily license the tech but want ALL the customer data off the car.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#107

Post by molszanski » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:23 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #84

skrowl wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Siri is especially bad when compared to Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa, both of which are light years ahead. Usual Apple reliance on their fans buying their devices no matter how bad the software is.

Isn’t it more likely that the quality of the voice assistant isn’t that important to most buyers?

I think so too. I am pretty sure that data will show it too. Five years ago the NextGen computing platform that will change the world where smart speakers. Now it is almost a niche product.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#108

Post by darkwater » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:26 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #84

skrowl wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Siri is especially bad when compared to Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa, both of which are light years ahead. Usual Apple reliance on their fans buying their devices no matter how bad the software is.

Isn’t it more likely that the quality of the voice assistant isn’t that important to most buyers?

(gonna be downvoted to death) Usually Apple die-hard buyers tend to minimize the importance of software/features that are not sported by an i-device or that doesn't work well there. When the 1st iPhone was released, the lack of native apps was a selling point "we use the web standards". When apps were introduced, they were again a selling point (and still are to the present day).

The day Siri will work equal to/better than other competing systems, it will be used as a main reason for which you should buy an Apple device. The day before that, it will still be something that users actually don't want.

EDIT: and to be a bit more clear that I'm serious with this, it actually makes sense. If a feature doesn't work well, you find ways around it. And if you are used to an ecosystem, maybe you don't even know how well another ecosystem works. And finally, if that ecosystem works for you well enough - or that device - you probably really don't care about that missing feature.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#109

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:27 PM UTC

samstave wrote: post #76

16bytes wrote: post #63

For those confused, this acquisition is due in large part by Nuance's dominance in healthcare related products. From Nuance's last earnings release[1]: “We are very pleased with the strong start to the fiscal year, as we delivered revenue and EPS above our guidance range expectations,” said Mark Benjamin, Chief Executive Officer at Nuance. “We continued to advance our strategic initiatives, accelerating our cloud tra…

And now you know why there will never ever ever be “free healthcare for all” in the US because this is how profitable sickness is. Plandemic.

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#110

Post by CharlesW » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 2:29 PM UTC

bombcar wrote: post #7

Is it just me or have speech recognition platforms like Siri actually gone backwards in the last few years (roughly coinciding with the AI/ML craze)? It feels (anecdata) that Siri is doing a bit better on voice to tex when sending messages but much worse on simple commands like “turn off living room lights”.

> Is it just me or have speech recognition platforms like Siri actually gone backwards in the last few years…

I've used both Siri and Alexa daily for many years, and used to rag on Siri a lot. In my experience Siri has caught up to Alexa on most fronts, and I find them more or less interchangeable my common use cases (home automation, timers/alarms, music, news/weather summaries, etc.).

That's not saying much since the Alexa bar is quite low. But like many Apple products, I'd characterize Siri's improvements as "slow and steady" for almost a decade now.