22nd
It’s a close race right now. So far Microsoft has the best working interface with Kinect, but Apple’s iTV seems to be an almost certain launch this year (according to Bloomberg).
Microsoft
“The Microsoft Xbox Kinect, a motion-sensing camera for the popular Xbox 360 video game console, has a built-in microphone and software to understand voice commands to search the Web using Microsoft’s Bing search engine, or to navigate between different video games and apps for streaming video such as Netflix and Hulu.”
“For months, Microsoft has been rumored to be building its Kinect motion and voice technology into TVs, so that an Xbox 360 and external device aren’t needed. At the CES, Microsoft demoed interactive episodes of Sesame Street in which viewers spoke to characters and relied on gestures, such as throwing imaginary coconuts, to interact with the likes of Grover and Elmo.”
“Google’s Google TV software, available on set-top boxes and TVs from the likes of Sony, Samsung, LG and Vizio, includes a feature to search the Web using voice commands spoken into a Google TV app found on handsets running Google’s Android operating system or Apple’s iPhone.”
“On Sep. 29, 2011 — six days before Apple introduced the iPhone 4S with Siri, the voice-commanded personal assistant app — Google turned in a supplement to a May 19, 2011, filing with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that described technology that uses remote controls or handheld computers (smartphones and tablets) as an intermediary to tell a TV, by voice, to change the channel or even seek out specific programs.”
Apple
“Apple has been long rumored to be working on what has been unofficially dubbed the “iTV,” a television set of its own that could use the iPhone’s Siri technology to find TV shows or channels on demand.”
“In a biography of Jobs written by Walter Issacson and published shortly after Jobs’ death in October, Jobs said that he had figured out an approach to TV that he thought could disrupt the $100-billion television industry.”
(via Google, Microsoft, Apple and the race to a talking TV - latimes.com)
