By Chris Chang, posted Feb 8, 2012 at 2:48 PM, 681 views,

Apple Is Preparing to Bring Support For The Chinese Language to Siri?

While Apple fans around the globe have had the iPhone 4S for awhile now, many of our friends in China haven’t gotten to enjoy the little chit-chat with the über-popular foreign beauty Siri, and in fact, they were heartbroken when they found out Siri doesn’t speak Chinese yet. Apple has announced that it plans to add support for Chinese to Siri in 2012, and the latest news we’re hearing is that Siri will launch in Chinese next month, and according to a Chinese tech site’s sources, it is already undergoing internal testing this month.

According to Chinese tech site DoNews, Apple is preparing to bring support for the Chinese language to Siri on the iPhone 4S next month, but the Chinese support will only include Mandarin (Putonghua), with Cantonese and Taiwanese Mandarin being left out for the time being. What’s more, Apple will also add Maps and local search support for Siri in China, which should come as good news to Chinese iPhone users. Currently, Maps and local search support for Siri is available only to users in the U.S.

One More Thing

Meanwhile, there’s a Chinese Siri wannabe for Chinese iPhone users who are using China Mobile’s network. China Mobile has been providing a so-called “10086” SMS customer service hotline which could handle more than mundane inquiries about the latest bill. The 10086 SMS customer service hotline has been backed by a powerful artificial intelligence program, and its responses may vary by users’ location. It’s similar to Siri, responding instantly to your questions with a sense of humor. Below is a sampling of us having a conversation with 10086.

Me: “I love you.”
10086: “I really like you too.”

Source: DoNews