14 DAY TRIAL // Dag Kittlaus, one of the co-founders of Siri (the intelligent digital personal assistant company later bought by Apple) is no longer on Apple’s payroll as of last week, sources close to the situation inform.
Kittlaus didn’t experience any fallout with any of the executives at Apple, as some may think. His reasons for departing were strictly personal, according to All Things D, and his leave was “amicable”.
He had actually planned to leave while back, mainly because his family lives in Chicago. Kittlaus also reportedly wanted some time off to brainstorm new entrepreneurial ideas. He left Apple right after the iPhone 4S announcement earlier this month, said the quoted sources.
Siri is now a key selling point of Apple’s iPhone 4S, the latest iPhone model that exclusively boasts the personal assistant feature. The assistant was previously available to iOS customers as a standalone, downloadable application, which is no longer operational as of the iPhone 4S announcement.
Many early adopters are now upset they can no longer use the service on their old-generation iPhones.
Siri is described by Apple as “an intelligent assistant that helps you get things done just by asking. Siri understands context allowing you to speak naturally when you ask it questions,” according to Cupertino.
The app, now embedded in iOS 5, helps you send text messages or email, take and place calls, schedule meetings and reminders, jot down notes with your voice, search the web, find all kinds of stuff near you, get directions and lots more.
“You can also get answers, find facts and even perform complex calculations just by asking,” according to Apple’s description.
You can ask Siri pretty much anything and it will use whatever tools it has at its disposal, such as Wikipedia and Wolfram Alpha, to give you not one, but several relevant answers.