Comments on: iPhone: Has Google lost its voice? (UPDATE)

By: cynik, switzerland

cynik, switzerland — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 13:39:32 +0000

Has anyone noticed that Apple have removed the "Free apps" section from the iTunes App store?

Now there is a "top free apps", but that is it. If you want to find the other free apps, you have to hunt around pages and pages of Apps that cost money.

Now if you knew my phone bills, you'd know my point is not that it is hard to scam free apps. The point is that Apple are spending time making life hard for people to do what they want to do.

I will repeat that sentence, just in case the divine being ever reads this blog.

Apple are spending time making life hard for people to do what they want to do.

That is not only the precise opposite of what made Apple great, it is precisely the sort of corporate dishonesty that has made people loath microsoft.

I think Apple has huge, huge problems, in terms of leadership. They are creating a mega firm who feel they can dictate to the market, and they have begun to downgrade the efficacy of their products because their executives are so very clever, and know more than the market.

Apple are already hated by a lot of people. They are beginning to become hated by their development community. When that happens, I see viruses everywhere on the mac platform, and a sustained anti Apple campaign by people who know what they are talking about.

ex ped: Very interesting. Thanks. I see that in addition to the 10 top free apps displayed on the opening screen, the App Store will, if you click on the little gray arrow, display the 100 top free apps. (Same as they do with paid apps.) If you had your druthers, what would you have Apple do?

By: MNR, San Diego

MNR, San Diego — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 22:50:54 +0000

MS Live Search on Windows Mobile has had voice search with GPS location of results for over a year now.

By: Adam, Los Angeles, CA

Adam, Los Angeles, CA — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 03:40:22 +0000

People don't do research on an iphone. They do it on their desktop or notebook or UMPC. I found some voice recognition software named Tazti speech recognition that actually is a free download and performs voice searches of Google, Yahoo, MSN, Wikipedia, Amazon, eBay and many other websites. It also lets me log into and navigate Facebook and Myspace by talking to my PC. It really works well.

Here's their youtube demo video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1tt_aeIAM8

By: Oh Blah Dee Blah Dah

Oh Blah Dee Blah Dah — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 02:08:42 +0000

RE: "… available “as soon as Friday” on its App store …"

"as soon as Friday" does NOT mean that it WILL be available Friday, or Saturday, or Sunday, or even next week.

"as soon as" is an indefinite time period. The application can come ANYTIME from Friday or after.

Chill.

By: SF, CA

SF, CA — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 00:55:10 +0000

I believe the app is probably held back by Apple because of the review.

By: severe, Long Beach, CA

severe, Long Beach, CA — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 23:07:25 +0000

Found: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3z7Tw1K17A

ex ped: Thanks!

By: JeffEd, Tampa, Florida

JeffEd, Tampa, Florida — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 21:03:06 +0000

I think it's pretty safe to say if it's a Google App, it's most likely still in Beta

By: Roger, Irvine, Ca

Roger, Irvine, Ca — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 20:58:59 +0000

There are several Youtube videos that were obviously made by Google, itself. So, this is obviously not just some rumor that someone made up. One of the Youtube videos goes from employee to employee, about 20 employees, throughout Google's corporate office; so this is not just something that some blogger made up. This is for real. But where is it???

By: John Kendrick

John Kendrick — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 18:55:15 +0000

Can't wait for this application. It will truly be groundbreaking for the iPhone, especially coming from Google.

If you're interested, you can read about my experiences with many of the web and native apps I've used since my original iPhone and more recent iPhone 3G purchases on my blog at

http://johnkendrick.wordpress.com

Just click on the index for a complete listing. John

By: Glenn, Bristol, England

Glenn, Bristol, England — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 18:39:26 +0000

Google may have um… announced the app update before it had got approval for release from Apple and it's thieving SDK agreement? If that is the case then this is a really arkward situation for Cupertino. Or maybe this is a stunt to show how much more open the app store for Android is?