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Re:Amazon Echo by mrb on Thursday November 06, 2014 @03:20PM (#8569502)
You make it sound like nobody has a "leg up" semantic voice commands. But we do and it is perfectly usable, at least on Android devices where you can ask these questions to Google Now:

Q: How tall is the Empire State Building?

Q: When was it built?

Q: Show me Italian restaurants nearby.

...

(I am not familiar with how Siri or Cortana handle similar queries.)

Re:Amazon Echo by ipavl on Thursday November 06, 2014 @09:02PM (#8570901)
> (I am not familiar with how Siri or Cortana handle similar queries.)

Cortana can handle the first and the last one, and for certain queries she can "continue the conversation". For example, the following is possible:

Q: Show me Italian restaurants nearby. (list of 10)

Q: Which take reservations? (filtered list)

Q: Which ones have at least three stars? (filtered again)

Q: (with one result left) Is it open tomorrow?

Q: Call them.