TightWind is written by Kyle Baxter. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Kontra:

A transactional Siri has the seeds to shake up the $500 billion global advertising industry. For a consumer with intent to purchase, the ideal input comes close to “pure” information, as opposed to ephemeral ad impression or a series of search results which need to be parsed by the user. Siri, well-oiled by the very rich contextual awareness of a personal mobile device, could deliver “pure” information with unmatched relevance at the time it’s most needed. Eliminating all intermediaries, Siri could “deliver” a customer directly to a vendor, ready for a transaction Apple doesn’t have to get involved in. Siri simply matches intent and offer more accurately, voluntarily and accountably than any other method at scale that we’ve ever seen.

Siri could undermine mobile advertising as a whole because it knows (or at least can know) what the user wants. There’s no need to display ads, because the user’s desire is already known: all Siri needs to do is connect the user to the appropriate service.

Fascinating point from Kontra. In large part, by only connecting users with services or vendors when they ask for it, this approach also avoids much of the privacy creepiness that Google’s approach entails. The user affirmatively requests Siri to do something for them, and then it uses their information to take an appropriate action.