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Talking To Computers?
merlock18 writes "Is it un-natural to talk to a computer? After discussing the outcome of the Jeopardy game with some colleagues, they seem to think it is mildly 'scary' to talk to a computer and have it competently talk back. Is this what everyone thinks? I was thinking to myself how much I would like to be able to even tell my computer to open programs by telling it vocally. A simple idea that I am fairly surprised is not common. Am I a minority in this one? Do people just not like the idea of talking (without cursing) to a computer, let alone have it act or reply? Would anyone else be interested in building their own mini-Watson, or is this just scary?"
I can't speak for anybody else, but a lot of the time I don't *want* people to overhear what I'm asking my computer to do...
Open the pod bay doors, Hal.
Just give it 30 years. Once it becomes publicly available, it only takes one generation for society to get used to new tech.
Personally, I find it impressive but annoying. I'm already driven nuts by people talking on cell phones all day, and I don't want to hear and endless stream of command instructions, either.
I wonder if there has been any research on the uncanny valley for speech...
Someday speech will be an important input method. But not any time soon.
If you have to wear a microphone it isn't ready yet.
If you have to use a PTT switch it isn't ready yet.
If you have to repeat or cancel more than 1% of the things you say it isn't ready yet.
If you have to spend as much time proofreading dictation it has taken down and correcting the mistakes, it isn't ready yet.
If you have to speak in an unnatural way it isn't ready yet.
If it won't work in almost any environment it isn't ready yet.
Democrat delenda est
Watson’s avatar, which viewers will see behind a standard Jeopardy! podium, is designer Joshua Davis’ artistic representation of the machine. It does not provide eyes or ears for Watson. Instead, Watson depends on text messaging, sent over TCP/IP, in order to receive the clue. At exactly the moment that the clue is revealed on the game board, a text is sent electronically to Watson’s POWER7 chips. So, Watson receives the clue text at the same time it hits Brad Rutter’s and Ken Jennings’ retinas.
Source: http://ibmresearchnews.blogspot.com/2010/12/how-watson-sees-hears-and-speaks-to.html
For another, it negates the only advantage (from a consumer perspective) of touchtone menu systems - the ability to quickly navigate when you know your choice ahead of time; or even when you hear it spoken without having to wait for the full menu of options. It seems that most systems allow touchtone interrupt, but don't allow voice interrupt, so if I press "5" for technical support it's fine - but I can't say "technical support" without being forced to listen to all the options.
gawk; grep; unzip; touch; strip; init,
uncompress, gasp; finger; find,
route, whereis, which, mount; fsck; nice,
more; yes; gasp; umount; head, halt,
renice, restore, touch, whereis, which,
route, mount,
more, yes, gasp, umount, expand, ping,
make clean; sleep
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
I, of course, am now officially older than dirt. A couple of years ago, when I finally got my iPhone, I got the Google search app of course. I used it, it worked, I liked it. When I put the damned phone down, I thought, "If somebody had handed me this when I was fourteen I would have thought it was a phony Hollywood prop." That was when I decided that computers should only be addressed by means of picking up the mouse, pressing one of its buttons, and speaking clearly and distinctly into it in a fake Scottish accent.
"Here's what's happening. You're starting to drive like your Dad..." - Red Green
Ah, so you didn't see that episode..
By mistake he just said "Earl Gray, hot" - and spent the rest of the show running from a rather flustered older gentleman.
It's The Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."