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Why I'm Not Buying The iPhone 5, And Why You'd Be Wise Not To Too

A year ago, the feverish anticipation built up for the latest Apple conference proved unsubstantiated. With many expecting the long-awaited unveil of the iPhone 5, the reveal of a slightly-updated iPhone 4 with voice assistant Siri meant many were left a little cheated. As is tradition, sales told a different story, with consumers lapping up the 4S in droves despite such minute changes over its predecessor. Tomorrow, the cycle starts up again.

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Apple WWDC: Tim Cook Reveals Next-Gen Macbook, iOS6, Siri For iPad

It might have been lacking any solid information on when we can expect the iPhone 5 or indeed the much-discussed Apple iTV, but if anything the announcements made by Apple at its Worldwide Developers Conference keynote last night more than made up for their notable absence. Tim Cook teased the tech world watching at the opening of the annual presentation that the company had some “real cool stuff” to show, and in that sense the offering did not disappoint.

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Siri Silenced. Updated To Not Say Lumia 900 Is 'Best Smartphone Ever'

It's common knowledge that Apple has a rather dry, sarcastic sense of humour when it comes to some of the responses that their automated assistant, Siri, gives to the user.  But it seems they weren't a fan of the assistant's Wolfram-reliant response to the question "What is the best smartphone ever?"

So they have changed it rather rapidly from the original answer of the Nokia Lumia 900 to one of two sarcastic responses: "the one you're holding" and "you're kidding, right?"  

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The Apple HDTV Is Real And Will Feature Siri And Video Calling Via Facetime

News surrounding an Apple-branded high-definition TV has been somewhat scarce these past few months. We first caught wind of the strong possibility of such a device in November of last year, although we had heard little since then. And yet, the Apple iTV is entirely real, according to a source close to Cult of Mac, and he’s not working off of leaked memos or estimations: he’s seen it with his own two eyes.

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Water In The Desert - Why Apple Didn't Launch Siri For The iPad

One of the features not brought to the iPad was, somewhat surprisingly, Siri.  Instead, Apple announced a dictation option for translating your words to text.  Apple ordinarily does an excellent job of adapting features of one product line for another; and at first glance Siri would appear to be an excellent fit for their tablets. But a close look at how Apple has presented Siri to the public shows why it could not have been brought to the iPad in a way that preserves it’s concise, understandable messaging.

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Siri tells 12 year old to "Shut the f*ck up"

One particular aspect of Siri, beyond identifying the best locations to hide bodies, is the ability to instruct to refer to you as a name of your choice.  A feature that was exploited, as young Charlie Le Quense fell victim to a hurl of expletive abuse.

Shut the f*ck up, you ugly tw*t.

In-store gadget trolling hits a new level.  Regardless of the slight chuckle some people would share at the situation, you can't help but feel sorry for the kid in this situation, walking up to an iPhone 4S demo unit in his local Tesco (Coventry) and enquiring about how many people there are in the world, only to be told in a vulgar fashion to promptly be quiet.

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Siri turns 'Sirial Killer' in Holiday Horror Movie

Though Siri is at best a middling distraction on the iPhone 4S for most of us, it's nevertheless an incredible piece of technology. Advanced voice recognition, sophisticated artificial intelligence, a smattering of humorous responses... But what we didn't know is that Siri actually has a mind of its own and is on a mission to “kill the humans."  Something that we find out in this hilarious spoof movie trailer, 'Siri: The Holiday Horror Movie'.

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Santa still uses Siri

So in the battle between Android and iOS, we've got one particularly strong opinion in the form of Chris Cringle checking the weather, messages from Mrs Claus and just how busy his schedule is, in a trailer you can't help but smile a little at.

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The Round-up: Phishing for Xbox, Myspace Tom and The Minority Report

This week has been huge, so it's warranted the welcome return of the round-up: putting everything that happened last week on one page for you to digest.  We've had everything from The Sun, 7-inch tablets and Myspace Tom to HMV On Demand, William Shatner and a rocket launch.  Even a tricky question is answered: what happens online when you die?  So let's get started.

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Siri protocol hacks: start your car and control your house

As soon as mobile developers Applidium cracked the Siri security protocol (the wall that stops it from working on anything other than an iPhone 4S) and released a set of developer tools to expand upon what the service does already, various prototypes have already made it into the wild: from the menial tasks of changing your thermostat temperature to the more scary possibilities like starting your car.

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