Why in the *^#& can't we rename Siri?

Software
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Why can’t we rename Siri so that each device we have is unique? You can designate words or phrases to activate shortcuts for different apps? Why not for Siri itself? If the user could activate Siri with something like, “Hey, iPhone” or “Hey, iPad” or “Hey, Stupid” (for talking to my iPhone), or “Hey, (you fill in the blank)”. Right now I have a Watch, an iPad, an iPhone and an iMac, all within shouting distance. I have Hey Siri on the iPhone and activate Siri by pressing the crown. But, no way to use it on the iPad or iMac.

Besides making it easier for the users, podcasters would not have to tread on eggshells when they are talking about Siri. I heard one the other day who had to bleep out a section because he used the magic words and probably would have set off 100,000 Apple devices had he not. As it was, he apologized to his live audience for doing it.

There must be a reason for not doing such a simple thing. Could it be accomplished, at least on iOS, by using shortcuts to activate Siri by unique words?

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You might argue there is an especial premium on not getting false positives for “Hey Siri”. Oh wait… :slight_smile:

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Apple could allow Siri to be triggered from a shortcut, and have the phone actively listen.
You could then name it anything and you would be able to disable “hey Siri”

Not sure I’d want it to parse everything all the time though…

4

IMO, it’s because Apple doesn’t want millions of people using a derogatory name to summon their digital assistant.

I turned off “Hey Siri” on my iPhone and iPad some time ago. I tried to use it for years and finally gave up. Now I press the side button to leave a reminder or add something to a task list. I use one of Siri’s much smarter “classmates” to control my lights and TV or request information from the web.

Now that the Mac has finally been shown some love, maybe Apple will start working on getting Siri out of third place. I’d love to see “her” catch up with the rest of the class.

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I think they should allow it for accessibility reasons. Not everyone is equally able to say it clearly. You can do a workaround with dictation on the Mac, but not on phones (that I’m aware of.)

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I never use the “Hey, Siri” feature. It had some novelty, but not any real benefit.

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This issue drives me wild, too. Trying to ask Siri on your homepod to turn on white noise, but having your watch and/or your headphones answer and say it’s impossible… why not allow us to have per-device names?!?

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Coming back to this after the WWDC keynote. I really hoped to see this implemented in iOS 15, but…NO. So, I’ll have to disable Siri voice command on all but one of the several devices that are subject to being in range of each other, and hundreds of podcasters will still have to say, “Hey, lady” when they’re talking about Siri in order to avoid sending millions of iOS devices into Siri mode. Geesh! Such a simple thing.

Note: Why couldn’t somebody develop a simple app to listen for a key phrase and use that as a trigger to open Siri on the specific device?

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That would be nice. My solution was to disable “Hey Siri” on everything except my HomePod. I rarely use it and just push the power button when I do.

Try using Hey “on-device intelligence”. Seems like that’s what they were calling Siri during the keynote.

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Yeah. I mostly use it on my Apple Watch, and I just enable it by pushing the crown (no voice activation). I may have the voice activation on my iPhone, but I’m not even sure about that.

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