Siri

Dag Kittlaus, creator of Siri, recently gave a keynote at Technori Pitch and talked about how much Steve Jobs disliked the name Siri. Only after he couldn't think of a better alternative did he finally succumb to using the name.

A recent survey of 482 iPhone 4S owners by Parks Asspociates found that 87% used Siri monthly, while a third used it daily to make calls, send SMS messages, and make web searches.

iOS 5.1 landed earlier this month without much fanfare, but there's one nice little nugget that we hadn't noticed before; when searching for restaurants through Siri, tapping on listings will launch right into Yelp.

While the new iPad doesn't include full on Siri support, probably for a number of reasons, it does include the speech-to-text Dictation. However, Dictation may not be enabled by default, and if it's not, it's not at all obvious where to go looking for it.

A class action suit has been raised against Apple claiming Siri does not appear to work as advertised. Siri was launched as a key feature of the latest iPhone 4S however it has always carried the tag of beta software.

Along with the new iPad announcement, Phil Schiller noted some new additions to the device one of which, is voice dictation.

Apple has just announced from the iPad 3 event that their popular voice assistant, Siri, will be making its way to customers in Japan. It will be part of iOS 5.1 which will be available starting today. Siri will be rolled out in Japan over the next few weeks.

Siri is currently available in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, and France. This aligns with Apple's plan to roll out Siri to even more countries during 2012.

Siri on the iPad would need to address connectivity, user interface scaling, and some long missing apps

I would love to have Siri, Apple's voice-controlled virtual assistant, on the iPad 3. I wrote in my iPad 3 event preview preview that I anticipate it, and not a day goes by that I don't instinctively reach for the Dictation button on the iPad 2 keyboard and then grumble when I realize for the umpteenth time that it's just not there.

But as much as I love the idea of Siri on the iPad, there are some challenges Apple would need to overcome.

Mercedes Benz has announced that its new A-Class range of cars will have a new infotainment system which will be centered on the iPhone 4S and Siri. The new system will be announced and demonstrated at the Geneva Motor Show; which takes place next month.

The New York Times is reporting that Siri, a feature exclusive to the iPhone 4S, currently accounts for nearly 25 percent of all search queries conducted on the computational knowledge engine Wolfram Alpha.