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Jewish World Review May 29, 2012/ 8 Sivan, 5772 Save the questions for humans, not your phone By Mitch Albom
Not to a phone. It may be all the rage for celebrities in iPhone commercials to have pithy exchanges with Siri, the female-sounding voice assistant, but if you ask me, they just sound stupid. Like actress Or Maybe the worst is "Two iPhones walk into a bar," the machine says. "I forget the rest." Malkovich laughs, proving he's a good actor. Sorry. Not joining this club. I have often been guilty of purchasing the "latest technology" (and by "latest" I mean things that were new for six minutes). But I have enough experience talking to machines to know that a microchip is not your friend, no matter how close you keep it to your bed. Have you forgotten the frustrating electronic voices that now answer almost every business number you dial? "For English, press one. Para Espanol, dos. If you'd rather stick needles in your eye, press three." Or the voice technology in your car? I tried this once. It went like this: "Call Dad." " "Not "Starting call." "Stop." "Calling cop." "No -- call Dad." "To call Fred, say yes." "No!" "Calling Nome." Conversations with a car should be one way only. And they should be limited to "Oh, come on, come on" (when it won't start) and "You gotta be kidding me!" (every other problem). Asking a car to find the nearest Belgian restaurant is not really what But what really bothers me about this Siri rage is that the very devices that are keeping us from communicating with each other now suggest you get verbally cozy with them. But using voice recognition software and bouncing it through a server to a series of digital modeled answers is not the same as a lover whispering into your ear. These iPhone ads with Deschanel, Jackson and Malkovich suggest being alone with your device is sort of comfy, one-on-one time. It isn't. We've become so desensitized to one another that communication -- even eye contact -- is becoming a lost art. What scares me most about this Siri business isn't that they have technology that can mimic human conversation, but that humans might actually prefer it over the real thing. What'd I prefer to hear in one of those spots is this: "Siri, how many ounces in a cup?" "Can't you ask your mother?" "All right, text mother." "She'd rather hear your voice." "I don't want to talk to --" "Too late, here she is." "Son, is that you?" "Uh, hi, Mom. Just thinking of you ..." Let me know when they invent a dialogue string like that. Until then, I'll limit my conversation partners to those that have lips and tongues. Even if they can't find organic mushrooms.
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