14 DAY TRIAL // Everybody admits it: the next battle will be all about virtual assistants and virtual reality. The other one is pretty simple: good graphics, lighter headsets, and better integration with the mobile ecosystem. The first one, however, is the one giving headaches to the user and even more problems to the developers.
Every virtual assistant on the market (and I am thinking of Siri, Google Assistant, Amazon Echo, and other small ones) has a server side in order to process the information it gives to the user, a voice recognition side, and an interface to present the data (voice or screen). The way they use that info and decode it is what differentiates one from the other.
The way virtual assistants work
Google, for example, knows more about you if you give it access to your email account, calendar appointments, contacts, and other apps. Their virtual assistant crawls all that information and knows when you are going on vacation, the flight number and all the details about your hotel reservation. This is truly valuable data, and who would not give it to a computer in order to get fast and accurate responses to a query? Well, if you knew that all that info was given away to a 3rd party, would you let your virtual assistant crawl your email?
There is also another side to Google's product. Their search engine knows what you are looking for and can use that info to serve you better info. The price you pay is again your privacy.
Amazon Echo knows everything about your Amazon purchases, the products you love and use, how often you need them, and so on. What if Amazon sold the anonymous info to big brands so that they know how to market stuff to you?
The old fashion way
Siri is a little bit different. Back in 2010, Steve Jobs was invited to D8 Conference, and he was asked to talk about privacy. His take was pretty clear: "We worry about location in phones and we worry that some 14 year old is going to get stalked because of our phone, so before any app can get their location data, we don't make a rule that they can put up a panel and ask for that. They make a call and we put up a panel saying this app wants to use your location data. Is that OK? And we do that every time. We have rejected a lot of apps that want to take a lot of personal data and suck it up into the cloud. We are old fashioned about privacy."
Siri was in its infancy back in 2010, but now you can find it on an Apple TV, and it may soon come to the Mac. There are a lot of apps that are not downloaded from the App Store on the Mac, so all your personal info may fly away to a remote location if you are willing to use a virtual assistant that works like Google's, and not like Siri.
Chatbots and the future of messaging
Facebook could not miss the opportunity to be in the next wave of the tech revolution. The Beta version of the Messenger Platform announced a month and a half ago is the perfect way big "sugar water" companies can interact with their customers. Automated customers support, interactive content and even online shopping experiences guided by chatbots can increase sales and lower the workforce needed for huge operations.
The first problem big companies are going to have is to choose from different providers when it comes to developing their chatbots. Kik, Line, Telegram, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger are just a few of those that will offer a development environment. Facebook or WhatsApp will probably have all the big names associated with them just because this is where all the users are. However, concerns about privacy may push users to apps like Telegram.
Apple has its own iMessage platform, but for some reason, I don't see them running to the big retailers and giving them the tools to develop chatbots for it. This time, it is not necessarily about privacy, but just to keep iMessage as a platform for individual users, and not turn into means of communication for the big brands.
The battle with FBI strengthened Apple's position as a freedom and privacy fighter. Giving all that away just so that Siri becomes smarter will not happen anytime soon. Apple has the opportunity to let everyone know that creating a virtual assistant can be done even if you are now crawling the user's email, calendar, and contacts list. But we are just two weeks away from WWDC 2016, and we will see if they will keep Siri just as interesting, relevant and smart as its competition.
After all, Google will not shy away from the iPhone. It's not like if Siri stays the same, users will not get access to one of the best virtual assistants out there. You can always install Google on your iPhone and get the same support as an Android user, with the cost of your privacy. We may also see Siri going to the TimeCapsule or other home devices.
As long as the information you give your virtual assistant is under control, our daily schedule sounds like it is going to be better managed by our virtual friends.