AI assistants are really good at what they do but sometimes it’s not a welcome sight when you hear Siri or Google Assistant answering you a question allowing everyone to hear and worst of when the question could potentially be an embarrassing one. Apple tends to fix this problem by making Siri whisper her answers to you.
Apple filed a patent last year which was made public now, the patent states that Siri normally responds in a regular or loud voice, which could be undesired under certain circumstances where a whisper response more appropriate. Other examples that they mentioned is using Siri in a library or an office cubical or just a general method to protect privacy. Siri enabled devices could measure the input’s amplitude and frequency patterns to determine if the reply should be a whisper.
We have seen patents that sound more like a gimmick rather than something that could be used in real life but this filing seems to hold some sustainable potential and would be a welcome sight if Apple actually manages to implement this into the iPhone and Apple Watch. All we need to do now is wait and see what is Google and Amazon’s move from here.
