As you know, in the United Kingdom if you own the new iPhone 4S the voice assistant, Siri has a male voice rather than its female US counterpart, but who is the mysterious character behind the Siri male voice? Well apparently he’s no longer mysterious as the guy behind the UK tone of Siri has come forth and spoken out.
According to The Telegraph, the UK voice of Siri didn’t start off at Apple, but was acquired when Scansoft merged with Nuance, the firm that worked with Apple to create Siri, and Siri’s actual name is Daniel and was recorded by a guy called Jon Briggs.
Jon Briggs is a former technology journalist that recorded the Daniel voice for Scansoft some 6 years ago would you believe, and apparently Apple asked Briggs not to speak about Siri, but as Briggs has not hand a contract with Apple he has now spoken out about his involvement.
Apparently Briggs made 5 thousand text to speech sentences recordings over the course of 3 week which were articulated in a flat and even tone after which the phonics where taken apart, and Briggs say that the result is as close to human speech as anything available out there.
According to Briggs, he first found out about his involvement with Siri and Apple when he saw demo on the TV, and says he believes Siri is a game changer and he loves Apple products.
Furthermore it would appear Briggs’ voice is quite popular as in the past he has been the voice of satnav for TomTom, Garmin, Porsche, Audi, Jaguar and Land Rover as will as Radio 2 and the Weakest Link.
So there you have it, you now know the origin of the UK voice of Siri on your iPhone 4S, although Siri does sound better than Daniel don’t you think?
If you have enjoyed this Phones Review article feel free to add me to your circles on Google+ and I will of course add you back.