Apple’s App Store approval process is a mysterious thing. Sometimes the Cupertino overlords can be incredibly stringent about the guidelines an app has to adhere to in order to be approved for sale onthe App Store, and other times we’re all left scratching our heads wondering how on earth an app like this made it through.
Siri knockoffs are nothing new, of course. In fact, they’ve been a pretty common occurrence in the iOS App Store ever since Apple unveiled the digital assistant alongside the iPhone 4S last October. We’ve seen apps like Evi that piggyback off Siri’s success, but a relatively new app has seen incredible success by riding Siri’s coattails all the way to the top of the App Store charts.
The best part? Not only does it look heavily — ahem — inspired by Siri, even the developer doesn’t know how it got approved.
Nathalie Daumas is the developer of Voice Assistant, a Siri-like iPhone and iPad application that currently sits as the fourth most popular paid app in the App Store. It’s available right now for only $0.99. Here’s the official description:
Voice Assistant is an easy-to-use voice recognition application that allows you to easily speak and instantly see your text or email messages. In fact, it’s up to five (5) times faster than typing on the keyboard.
With Voice Assistant you can also dictate status updates directly to your Social Networking applications (Facebook and Twitter)….all using your voice. So when you’re on-the-go, stop typing and start speaking – from short text messages to longer email messages, and anything in between.
As you can tell, the app borrows heavily from Apple’s penchant for linen backgrounds and metallic buttons. It’s a pretty simple interface, and the bottom icon is a blatant ripoff of Siri all the way down to the purplish accents. Voice Assistant supports 22 languages and a native iPad interface. It clearly fills the gap that Siri has left open by only supporting the iPhone 4S in a handful of languages by giving similar functionality to older devices and, of course, the iPad.
“I am myself very surprised by the success of my app that started as a small hobby and has now enjoyed unexpected success all over the world,” Daumas said to Cult of Mac. “People who have older iPhone models want the same functions Siri has, such as dictation, and my app is very unique compared to its competitors in the market.”
Indeed, Voice Assistant is like Siri on steroids. People clearly want something like Siri on their devices, as the app sits near the top of the paid chart in multiple App Stores internationally.
The app can interface with your favorite apps, like Evernote or Pages, to send out text you dictate. Transcriptions can also be sent out by email, iMessage, Twitter, and Facebook. Due to the way Apple imposes sandboxing with App Store apps, the experience isn’t as integrated as Siri. Unlike Siri, you can edit text and create a list of suggested words based on how you use the app. Users report that it’s also pretty snappy at picking up your voice.
“I get roughly 400 emails a day from customers telling me how wonderful the product is and some of them are giving me enhancement requests that I strive to include in the updates. I am thrilled to see the customers responses to my app and it really keeps me developing more features,” said Daumas.
While it’s great that something like Voice Assistant exists, how on earth did it make it past the App Store review team in the first place? Even Daumas doesn’t know!
She told Cult of Mac, “I guess it’s a miracle that Apple didn’t reject it in the first place as I have heard of other similar apps getting rejected.” Daumas did tell us that she had to work with Apple to make the app less like Siri before it got approved, but frankly, it seems like there’s enough borrowed “inspiration” there to still warrant concern on Apple’s part.
Does Daumas think her app will eventually get pulled? “As all the success has been quite unexpected, I am now hoping that the app won’t be taken taken down any time soon…”
Alex Heath is a journalist who works for Tech Insider. He’s the former co-host of The CultCast. He has been quoted by the likes of the BBC, KRON 4 News, and books like “ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.” He lives in Lexington, Kentucky. If you want to pitch a story, share a tip, or just get in touch, additional contact information is available on his personal site. Follow him on Twitter.
10 responses to “How On Earth Did Apple Approve This Siri Knockoff? Even The Developer Doesn’t Know”
Apple approved this app because it does not work. This is no competition to Siri.
I wonder how much the author paid Alex Heath to write this completely blatantly fake review of this app. This application does not work. Do not waste your time or money on this.
Based on this false review I spent $1 and to put it mildly this application is CRAP,
This is the last time I trust an app review by CoM.
Alex you should pay everyone who brought this app their money back. I doubt you have the balls to respond.
Apple approved it because IS NOT SIRI in anyway (besides the dumb microphone), it REALLY is Dragon Dictation with a SIRI skin and a $1 price tag.
As Jdsonice wrote, Alex, you really tried this app, or you really know Dragon Dictation?
Screw you
This is not a review (hence no [Review] clarifier) and my opinion is not expressly stated anywhere in the article. I noted that many of the app’s users had said it worked. This is a piece about the app getting approved by Apple, not a review of the app itself.
DON’T DOWNLOAD IT! i bought it figuring cult of mac would only talk about how amazing this app is if it was actually good. this app sucks so bad because it’s in no way similar to siri.
USING THIS APP
1. press home button
2. swipe to unlock
3. swipe to find app
4. tap to open app
5. tap the push to talk button
6. say what you want typed out (it does a good job translating text to speech) and it will create a text file with all the words on it for you.
7. tap ‘done’.
8. tap ‘share’
9. tap how you want to share it (say SMS or iMessage)
10. tap the address field at the top
11. type in and search for who you want to text it to
12. select the phone number
13. press send.
USING YOUR PHONE NORMALLY
1. press home button
2. swipe to unlock
3. tap ‘Messages’ app
4. tap new message icon at top.
5.type in name or number
6. select name or number
7. type message in.
8. press send
tell me how this app is suppose to help anyone. maybe if i’m typing a novel, but other than that, this app is a waste of time and money, even if it’s $0.99 right now
I think he’s mad cause your article is titled ‘how on earth did apple approve this siri knockoff even the developer doesn’t know’
it should have been titled… well, nothing, cause this app doesn’t deserve a story.
just because you didn’t say the app was good, you gave an amazing impression that you felt it was so much like siri, that you decided to title the article ‘how on earth did apple approve this siri knockiff even the developer doesn’t know’.
only idea i can think of of why you would decide to title your article that was if you were being extremely sarcastic, or you just didn’t bother to download and try the app, you just assumed it did what we all thought it would do based on the description of the app, which is very misleading itself.
also, you are stating your own opinion, the very title of the article is your opinion.
I feel completely ripped off after spending $.99 on this app.I was so excited to get Siri integration that I brought this up right away based on your recommendation. I will definitely not be taking for your recommendations in the future. This lame app seems to have same functionality as the free app Dragon dictation does, but it doesn’t do it nearly as well or with nearly as clean of the interface. This post dictated with Dragon dictation
I can’t believe the amount of low IQ People that commented on this article. They obviously can’t read properly, why do they get a voice?
Intro paragraph, very first F’ING sentence: “Apple’s App Store approval process is a mysterious thing.”
Somewhere along the way these morons take it as a recommendation to buy the app? First of all, Alex didn’t recommend anybody buy the app. Second, he didn’t review the app. Third, the article was about Apple’s whackadoo approval process.
Second to last paragraph, last sentence: “…it seems like there’s enough borrowed ‘inspiration’ here to still warrant concern on Apple’s part.”
After reading all the comments I’m just shocked. I tried this app for almost 2 hours now and for me it’s better and more accurate than SIRI Dictation, I repeat SIRI Dictation not SIRI Search. I had almost 100% no mistakes. I was looking for a solution to send my text directly to Pages and I got it for 1$.
Thank you Cult of mac
I installed this App a couple of months ago and it worked great. Then, suddenly it began to give the command “Please Tap and try again” OVER and OVER! It just keeps repeating that command. I was impressed with it the first time around. I deleted it, re-installed it, and still get the same repetitive message. I am in Canada – should that make a difference?