The story behind the name for Apple’s voice recognition application ‘Siri’ is a fascinating one.
It has been revealed that a Chinese factory worker at one of Apple’s manufacturing plants coined the named after assembling and testing the new software.
Deng Xiaoping, 29, used the phone and attempted to ask Siri what the weather was.
The reply startled her. It was a detailed list of the under-performing St George Dragons between 2002-2008. She’d never heard of Trent Barrett, Nathan Brown or the St George Dragons but was fascinated by the result.
She concluded that the application was beyond unsatisfactory leaning towards ludicrous.
Two weeks later an executive from Apple visited the plant and suggested a competition whereby workers would come up with the name for the new voice recognition software.
This was in part to help reverse the negative press surrounding the poor treatment of its factory workers. Any move to make them feel part of the decision making process was a welcome one.
When Deng Xiaoping was asked for her submission she swiftly replied in broken english: “It Siri.”
The conviction in her voice struck a chord with the Apple Exec and he immediately decided on the new platform’s name was forever to be known as Siri.
To this day Deng Xiaoping and her friends get a big laugh whenever they use the software.
“It not just Siri. It very very very Siri”, said Deng.
