This is Prashant , Co Founder of Shifu . Thanks Guys for hunting . @aditya : We do it by algorithmically analysing your usage pattern and predicting what you are most likely to do next . for example we look at your calling pattern based on time of the day(morning ,noon ,night ),day of the week(weekday /weekend), Location( Home/office, SF ,Delhi ) , activity( driving etc ) and learn what were your action in similar context and predict next thing you are likely to do . its a mix of art and science . would love to know your feedback about how good a job we are doing.
@Robert : very Valid question . To begin with we love Google Now and use it regularly. we are more of a complementary to them than competition.We are different in two ways .
#1 : We serve different use case . Google Now looks at couple of Fire hose of data like your search pattern, commute ,GMAIL,YouTube etc . ie data gathered from other google services and use it to surface these services as and when needed . We look at your device usage data like calling pattern ,battery charging and consumption etc to help you get more value from your device. That said YEs Google can always tress pass .
#2 : Underlying strategic purpose of Google Now is different from Shifu . We explained it in a blog post written sometime back . you can read it at https://medium.com/appy-thoughts...
@pacificleo I like the vision you develop in this article. Notification is indeed something that has still to be properly addressed, as it's really raw currently: something happens, you get notified ; if you want to see something that did not just happen or will happen later, now you're tons of tap away. Guessing what you want with the minimum amount of interactions - hopefully 0 - is indeed the way to go.
I have two remarks about that:
* the snooze feature from Inbox is a killing feature. Notification centers should have just that: just because I'm not interested in a notification now doesn't mean I won't be in 6 hours
* while I'm glad you release on android, your app seems a perfect use case for apple watch :) Did you do some research around android wearable, maybe?
@oelmekki We have some very interesting plans for wearable . you will see them soon . As we are a small team so Its just a matter of priority . stay tuned ..you will be amazed :)
Love the concept, but how is it going to compete with the likes of Cortana, Google now and to a lesser extend Siri? How does it work without some fairly serious data gathering? If the above three services have to be careful with privacy, at least they have the resources to protect the data...does Shifu have the same protections in place?
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