Siri Talk

Published on January 2017 | Categories: Documents | Downloads: 32 | Comments: 0 | Views: 249
of 5
Download PDF   Embed   Report

Comments

Content

Adam Cheyer

• What is the most amazing thing to you about Siri?
◦ The fact that it works!
• Early life
◦ Grew up in Boston
◦ Middle class family
◦ Younger brother, did a technology path through Netscape and Yahoo
‣ Joined together for Siri
◦ Has a younger sister
◦ Mom was copy editor, dad was environmental engineer
◦ Went to Brandeis
◦ Loved how computers work, even more interested in how people work
• Post graduation
◦ Had 3 job offers, didn't know quite what to do
◦ Focused on what was important to him - true value
◦ His goal: I want to learn a new language and see more of the world
◦ Verbally stated goal important, also important to tell people so they will help you
◦ Worked at a computer company in France
• Why does the goal have to be verbally stated, and what happened from that?
◦ If you stay true to yourself, you can make the right choice.
◦ Be the author of your life
• Decision to go to grad school
◦ Was bored
◦ Wanted to learn
◦ Went to grad school at UCLA :(
◦ But he thinks we're better: "They don't have this class. You guys have something special."
◦ Went for Masters of Science and Artificial Intelligence
‣ Usually takes 3 years, completed in 9 months
◦ Philosophy: do more than you think you can
◦ Just as stressed when he took a lighter course load
◦ Business and stress are constants
◦ Planned on going back to France, but wanted to start to form a career
◦ Burning question was: where can I stay for 10 years and not get bored?
‣ The answer: SRI International
‣ The researchers get to work on the most interesting problems
‣ It was a playground













‣ Completed more than 10 years and never got bored
Work at SRI
◦ Challenge - interact with a computer in a more natural way
◦ Created "web services before there was a web"
◦ Called it delegated computing
◦ Created a tablet computer in 1990, had speech and handwriting recognition
‣ "A vision for Siri"
Doug Engelbart
◦ Hero and friend
◦ Invented mouse
◦ Invented first email system
◦ Invented first hyperlink system
◦ Wrote a paper on word processing far before it existed
◦ Created the first multiple window system
◦ Showed off "mother of all demos" (need to look that up)
◦ More a social scientist than an engineer
◦ Did this because he wanted computers to be a better tool with which to solve the world's problems
◦ Invented term "collective intelligence"
Leaving SRI
◦ Two goals
‣ Need enough money to buy a house and support a child
‣ Want to take research ideas and try them
◦ In 1999 joined business to business e-commerce
◦ Joined VerticalNet
◦ Worked at a mobile computing company
Returned to SRI
◦ Mobile company sold to big company, didn't want to go
◦ CALO project - cognitive assistant that learns and organizes
◦ Became chief architect on CALO
2007
◦ Verbally stated goal - make five projects that could impact users
◦ Decided to pick the best and take it forward, but picked one major one minor in 2008. Ended up doing a "minor minor" too
The projects
◦ Engelbart vision - move the world forward
◦ How can you make a difference?
◦ Created Change.org
◦ Not a lot of money in nonprofits, needed some money













◦ Started Genetic Finance
◦ Originally started third as stealthcompany.com, ultimately became Siri
◦ Technology passion
How he raised money
◦ Change - self funded and funded by other people working on it
◦ Genetic Finance - raised angel funding
‣ Got people in finance world to contribute
◦ Siri - needed 20 incredible engineers
◦ Went to VCs
What Change.org does
◦ Today it is focused on campaigns
◦ 12 different areas - things like human rights, education, environment
◦ Campaigns are things that anyone can start
◦ Write a petition with a target and can promote it
◦ Now have 100 full time people
◦ It is profitable
◦ More than 10 million active users
◦ More than 1 million new users every month
◦ Often a main vehicle that comes to media attention
◦ Got news when Obama used Change.gov
Becoming an entrepreneur
◦ Started in his 40s, urges us to do it earlier
◦ "Starting a company from scratch is the most rewarding, exciting, fulfilling thing I've ever done."
◦ Created a list of the best people he ever wanted to work with
Siri
◦ Every early employee got a picture frame
‣ Told them to pick a hero, put his photo in it, and put a quote in it that captures something meaningful that shows what they stood for and said
◦ Siri not meant to replace people, built as a tool to enhance people
Working prototype
◦ Created demo in about a month
◦ Started in office in March 2008
◦ Took two years, launched in February 2010
Apple acquisition
◦ Steve Jobs called two weeks later
◦ First question was, "how did you get this number?"
◦ Looked at their developer account
◦ Went to Steve Jobs' house

◦ Became clear quickly that he was interested in working with them y
◦ "He was not kicking back relaxed. He had a fire like I've never seen in anyone else."
◦ Didn't jump, acquisition wasn't part of the plan
◦ Jobs persisted, and they eventually came to terms when vision was aligned
◦ Acquired in April 2010
• How he shared the news
◦ Called a roadmap meeting
◦ Steve Jobs and Scott Forstall walked through the door
◦ "Here's our roadmap"
◦ Stayed an hour or so answering every question employees had
◦ First time Steve Jobs had went to an acquired company and welcomed them to Apple
◦ Said to Adam, "I want Apple to be your candy store."
• Launch of the iPhone 4S
◦ Had no idea they would be so central to the launch
◦ Very emotional
◦ Goal was to make an app that was an icon on the wall of an Apple Store
◦ Siri became the front door
• Q&A
◦ Origin of the name
‣ Wanted it to be human like, short, easy to pronounce, not boring
‣ Did a sorting of available domain names with that criteria, and everyone had a different interpretation but everyone liked it
‣ For him it was a tip of the hat to SRI, means secret in Swedish so tip of the hat to stealth days
◦ Research world gives great way to generate and cultivate ideas
‣ Invaluable to learn commercial skills
‣ Sweet spot is the startup
‣ Can innovate faster than a big company but for real users
◦ People needed for a tech entity
‣ Idea man
‣ Executers
‣ Marketeers
◦ Siri's personality
‣ Wasn't planned, just happy it worked as well it did
‣ Surprise and delight
• Professional personality mostly about getting the job done
• But should go a little bit beyond

‣ Dealing with complexities of the human voice
• Algorithms for speech recognition have not changed much over 30 years
• Data problem: where do you get data of people speaking that can be transcribed?
• When people use it you can get data to improve it
‣ His belief on how to live your life:
• Tells himself he's the luckiest person in the world and works hard to make that so. Really believes in authoring your life.
‣ Really spend time on the words around your goals
• Each word should strike that core nerve of what's bothering you




Sponsor Documents

Or use your account on DocShare.tips

Hide

Forgot your password?

Or register your new account on DocShare.tips

Hide

Lost your password? Please enter your email address. You will receive a link to create a new password.

Back to log-in

Close