[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0pjD4qpIpg]
Microsoft ads seem to make a habit of bashing Apple, even using Siri’s voice to do so – and without the company concerning itself too much about accuracy. Microsoft has now released the 30-second commercial it first showed at its developer’s conference back in April …
As ever, Microsoft cherry-picks its examples to demonstrate the supposedly superior capabilities of its own Cortana rival. So far, at least, it doesn’t look like either Apple or Android handset manufacturers are losing too much sleep over Microsoft Phone handsets.
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At least it’s funny but based on Microsofts history I doubt very much any of it works as advertised.
I don’t know… Voice Command from 10 years ago was pretty good, and it didn’t require an Internet connection to look through my contacts and call someone.
That’s pretty irritating when the Internet is spotty.
Everything is nice on ads… Let’ see!
You’re right. Everything looks nicer on Ads.
Remember how polished Siri looked and sounded in the early Ads?
This ad sucks. Microsoft shows how weak they are when comparing iPhones 5S Siri and Windows Phones Cortana publicly… They are mocking iPhone 5S. It’s one of signs of being weak. One phone is better in one things, other in another things… Windows Phone sucks. This is fake. Microsoft still shows how weak are they changing the reality of Siri. I just said my opinion. *Sorry for bad english*
Have you ever used a Windows phone? I currently reside on team droid, but I have some friends that have them and they are REALLY nice; especially if you are the social networking type.
I’m in the iPhone camp, and my wife used a Windows phone, and she liked it.
Come on, guys, we’re not talking about whose baby is the cutest. These are just tools to do a job.
If my boss handed me a ‘droid phone and told me to use it, it’d take a while to learn it, same with Amazon, same with Windows.
I went from iPhone to Android and finally landed at Windows Phone. I only went to Windows Phone because my wife wanted the camera on the Nokia 1020 and I can tell you I am extremely impressed. Windows Phone has to be hands down the best UI I have used, it really makes iOS look dated.
Anyone else that has used a Windows Phone 8 device would have to agree, and with Windows Phone 8.1 (which I have installed) things just get better. Kudos to Microsoft for getting this one right.
It doesn’t mean they’re weak, it means they are not the market leader. Marketing 101: attack the market leader. If you are the market leader, talk about how great you are. Even Apple does this in areas where they are not the market leader… Remember the whole “I’m a Mac and I’m a PC” thing?” That’s attacking the market leader. Everyone does this because it works. It’s the same thing as negative ads in politics.
Anyone noticed the small letter at the beginning saying ‘Screens simulated, sequences shortened’??
AKA: “This is fake, but we’re allowed to falsely advertise thanks to this tiny sentence.”
With over 70% App store revenue being attributed to iOS and Windows Phone being grouped with “Other”, Microsoft needs to pull all the underhanded tricks it can or unifying Windows will mean goodbye to both Phone and RT. Satya Nadella seems pretty eager to undo Ballmer’s mistakes.
Wow. As an owner of a 5s, I can tell you that the commercial is wholly inaccurate. Siri can do reminders just fine. Also, there are suggested routes listed in notification centers today tab.
Yeah. Like all Microsoft ads, they’re just a little bit disingenuous. I remember their “Bing Challenge” they had going a year or so ago, where they asked people to do an internet search and choose between one of two options as providing the “best” results. One was an unbranded version of Google, the other was an unbranded version of Bing. Then after you chose, they’d tell you if you’ve chosen Google or Bing as providing the best results. Now the catch, was that you were choosing between a FULL version of Bing, and a hobbled version of Google. This was shortly after Google released its “Knowledge Graph” cards for Google Searches, and Bing disabled them for the “Challenge” so the results would look more like Bing to kinda level the playing field and be a truly “blind” test. But the problem with that is that the Knowledge Graph cards provide the most relevant search result/information.
Anyway, people would (by a decently large margin) choose Bing over Google as providing the best results, because Bing had disabled the part of Google that provides the most relevant information. Of course, Microsoft did mention they had disabled Google’s Knowledge Graph, but in minuscule text at the very bottom of the Bing Challenge page, buried in a bunch of other fine-print.
There was also the Windows Phone Challenge that Microsoft put on that basically said that if they asked you to access certain information before one of their reps using a Windows Phone could, they’d give you a free smartphone. Of course, the contest was in a sense rigged from the get-go. For instance, they’d say “Okay, whoever can get the stock info for Microsoft, and the weather in San Francisco first, wins.” But the rep’s Windows Phone was already equipped with a widget showing Microsoft’s Stock, as well as a widget showing the weather in San Francisco, so all they had to do, was unlock their phone and they’d yell “Done!” before you, the challenger could even perform a Google search or Siri search. So it was basically impossible for anyone to win. However, I remember one story of a guy who had disabled the “swipe to unlock” on his android phone and just happened to have widgets installed on his phone that provided the same information and was able to yell “Done” just by hitting his phone’s “wake” button. And the Microsoft reps did whatever they could to insist that the Android user was “cheating”, but after a few minutes of arguing that he had done no such thing, they reluctantly gave him a free phone as promised.
So basically this ad kind of feels the same way. I have no doubt Cortana can do all of those things, but they’re not exactly being fair to iOS which can and does provide all of that same information, admittedly, not in the same way that Cortana does. Instead, like you mentioned, iOS provides that info in other places, like in the notification center and “Today” tab. Of course, Android does all of the same things as well.
tl;dr
Microsoft does sketchy “not quite honest” comparison shit all the time.
Guys, stop whining about how Samsung or MS target Apple in their ads. The most memorable ad campaign Apple has rolled out in years revolved around making fun of a middle-aged, rather chubby guy called PC. (Which was a great campaign, I should add.)
Yeah. It was accurate. They didn’t have to lie to make fun of Windows. It’s easy to do. As someone who uses both Mac and PC every single day, Windows (even with 8.1) is still an embarrassment compared to the polish and capability of OS X.
Wait, what? iOS Siri is perfectly capable of making location-based reminders. And why are they using the old iOS 5 Siri voice from 2011 when the iPhone they are showing is clearly running iOS 7, which uses a more natural-sounding voice?
Microsoft ads can always be described by one word: Disingenuous.
Everyone, appreciate competition, don’t think small, there is always room for improvement…!
Wow, Siri can listen to the things that other phones say and understand exactly what they are saying and respond?? That’s AMAZING!! Siri is an advanced form of AI in this case! SIRI is so much better than just scripted responses to commands according to Microsoft! ;-)
(oh and Siri can give you reminders when you get to “someplace”… not sure why she thinks she can’t do that)
I am very skeptical of the functionally of MS. When I watched a video on cortana it was very buggy. I saw similar ads with Xbox one but it’s voice recognition was rather sad.
Either way, competition is good and I would like to see 3 viable smart phone options.
You can only mock another service if your own service offers everything the other one does. For instance, I can ask siri if my friend has arrived at work. Cortana can’t.
Great job for a company with 5% mobile market share.
There was a stage when Apple only had 5% of the mobile market. With Microsoft now being a hardware manufacturer as well as OS provider they can penetrate more of the market. They no longer need to convince manufacturers to take a risk on their OS when they can take all the risks themselves. Same formula as Apple in 2007/2008.