The document discusses the history of talking appliances from the 1970s to the 1990s. [1] In the 1980s, the price of speech chips dropped significantly, leading to a boom in talking appliances for various uses. [2] However, by the mid-1980s, talking appliances lost popularity among mass consumers who found them annoying. [3] While talking appliances failed in the mass consumer market, they found niche applications for the blind and in specialized industrial uses.
Importance of I/O devices,Types of input devices,keyboard
Pointing devices,Speech recognition,Digital camera
Webcam,Scanners,OCR,OMR,MICR,Bar-code reader
¿América Latina construida desde fuera? Uso de los escenarios digitales para ...Elias Said Hung
Presentación hecha en el marco de la Semana de Inmersión Tecnológica de la Universidad de la Sabana en enero de 2016, donde se exponen los resultados preliminares de estudio sobre la producción en Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades sobre América Latina, desde revistas indexadas en JCR, entre 2013-2015.
Bajo el epígrafe “Comunicar ya no es lo que era” hemos propuesto a nuestros colaboradores de este año que nos
dijeran cómo aventuraban los próximos meses.
Lo más importante para nosotros es conseguir aportar una aproximación lo más acertada posible al devenir comunicativo de nuestra sociedad, en un intento ambicioso de reunir talento, pluma e interés en un documento cuidado, moderno y de fácil uso.
Importance of I/O devices,Types of input devices,keyboard
Pointing devices,Speech recognition,Digital camera
Webcam,Scanners,OCR,OMR,MICR,Bar-code reader
¿América Latina construida desde fuera? Uso de los escenarios digitales para ...Elias Said Hung
Presentación hecha en el marco de la Semana de Inmersión Tecnológica de la Universidad de la Sabana en enero de 2016, donde se exponen los resultados preliminares de estudio sobre la producción en Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades sobre América Latina, desde revistas indexadas en JCR, entre 2013-2015.
Bajo el epígrafe “Comunicar ya no es lo que era” hemos propuesto a nuestros colaboradores de este año que nos
dijeran cómo aventuraban los próximos meses.
Lo más importante para nosotros es conseguir aportar una aproximación lo más acertada posible al devenir comunicativo de nuestra sociedad, en un intento ambicioso de reunir talento, pluma e interés en un documento cuidado, moderno y de fácil uso.
This project reports on how new research on ADHD meets service and systems oriented design. Master project from the Oslo School of Architecture and Design, 2013
A master project in Systems Oriented Design at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design in 2013. Partner is ABB.
Students: Amra Osmanovik and Hilde Dybdahl Johannesen
Systems Oriented Design project with ABB. Master project 2013 from the Oslo School of Architecture and Design. Students: Amra Osmanovik, Hilde Dybdahl Johannesen.
Even if you already know what a SWOT analysis is and what it’s used for, it can be tough to translate that information into something you can action.
It can also be hard to examine your own business with a critical eye if you’re not entirely sure what you should be examining.
Reading an example SWOT analysis for a business that is either in your industry or based on a comparable business model can help get you started.
All of our SWOT analysis examples are based on real businesses that we’ve featured in our gallery of free sample business plans on bplans.com
The following 6 examples are
broken into three parts:
1. A quick introduction to the company.
2. The company’s SWOT analysis.
3. Some potential growth strategies for the company based on what’s revealed by the SWOT analysis.
Topic Computing: A New Experience Paradigm for the Age of Information OverloadDavid Lavenda
Information overload is real and it’s getting worse. Work environments are particularly prone to overload, given the never-ending stream of emails, chat messages and application notifications workers receive on a daily basis. Interestingly, though, research shows that information overload at work is more often due to poor information quality rather than sheer quantity. (Information quality is considered poor when it’s disconnected and/or incoherent, making it difficult to decipher and process).
Artificial Intelligence Will Revolutionize Office 365-Based Collaboration & C...David Lavenda
Artificial intelligence together with the new Microsoft Graph are poised to change the way we work. But what’s real and what’s just buzz? In this session, harmon.ie Co-founder and VP Product Strategy, David Lavenda uncovers the truth about AI in the workplace, as he details how to leverage AI to extract value from your SharePoint, Office 365, and now Microsoft 365 investments. The session includes a live demo of how the Microsoft Graph today helps your SharePoint-based information compliance initiatives.
Topic Computing - Information Presented The Way You ThinkDavid Lavenda
Information workers use over 9 apps/day, and have more than half of them open at any one time. This work experience makes it difficult for them to focus on what's important and to see the big picture. New developments in artificial intelligence, specifically natural language processing and machine learning, offer a new way to interact with the apps we already have - by topics. Cognitive science teaches us that our brains think in terms of associated topics, so it just makes sense that our interaction with technology should be in terms of topics, such as customer, product, or service, rather than by apps such as Outlook, Word, Salesforce, and Zendesk. This presentation describes the promise of Topic Computing
Artificial intelligence is purported to improve workplace productivity. But does it really? This presentation takes a hard look at where AI is today and which aspects can truly help today's Digital Workplace improve productivity.
Office 2016 introduces Office Groups which is a new collaboration workspace. But Microsoft already has a collaboration workspace...SharePoint team web sites. What is the difference between the two and which one is the right tool for your collaboration project?
SharePoint Online and Office 365 retain some of the challenges present in Microsoft on-premises offerings. This presentation highlights some things you need to consider when you move to the cloud http://ow.ly/Qw9TK
The average workday has become disjointed. While workers enjoy the “freedom” that comes from being able to do their jobs without being chained to their desks, it is not without its obstacles. There is certainly no shortage of mobile apps for employees, yet each app only does one thing well, and it is becoming clear that work information is spread out between too many apps. As employees rely more on mobile access, the elusive single-screen, unified mobile experience could be the answer to enterprise information discovery woes. The presentation discusses ways to overcome the information overload challenge using contextual capabilities now provided by mobile devices, a consolidated user experience, and activity streams.
Two Strategies for Going Mobile: Which One is for You?David Lavenda
Four customer case-studies that demonstrate the merits of alternative strategies for ensuring the success of your mobile initiatives:
• delivering mass appeal mobile apps, or,
• rolling out high-value, mobile business services
Smart businesses understand that successful organizational initiatives entail a lot more than just buying technology. They require crafting and executing a results-oriented business strategy, a people strategy, as well as a technology strategy.
This project reports on how new research on ADHD meets service and systems oriented design. Master project from the Oslo School of Architecture and Design, 2013
A master project in Systems Oriented Design at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design in 2013. Partner is ABB.
Students: Amra Osmanovik and Hilde Dybdahl Johannesen
Systems Oriented Design project with ABB. Master project 2013 from the Oslo School of Architecture and Design. Students: Amra Osmanovik, Hilde Dybdahl Johannesen.
Even if you already know what a SWOT analysis is and what it’s used for, it can be tough to translate that information into something you can action.
It can also be hard to examine your own business with a critical eye if you’re not entirely sure what you should be examining.
Reading an example SWOT analysis for a business that is either in your industry or based on a comparable business model can help get you started.
All of our SWOT analysis examples are based on real businesses that we’ve featured in our gallery of free sample business plans on bplans.com
The following 6 examples are
broken into three parts:
1. A quick introduction to the company.
2. The company’s SWOT analysis.
3. Some potential growth strategies for the company based on what’s revealed by the SWOT analysis.
Topic Computing: A New Experience Paradigm for the Age of Information OverloadDavid Lavenda
Information overload is real and it’s getting worse. Work environments are particularly prone to overload, given the never-ending stream of emails, chat messages and application notifications workers receive on a daily basis. Interestingly, though, research shows that information overload at work is more often due to poor information quality rather than sheer quantity. (Information quality is considered poor when it’s disconnected and/or incoherent, making it difficult to decipher and process).
Artificial Intelligence Will Revolutionize Office 365-Based Collaboration & C...David Lavenda
Artificial intelligence together with the new Microsoft Graph are poised to change the way we work. But what’s real and what’s just buzz? In this session, harmon.ie Co-founder and VP Product Strategy, David Lavenda uncovers the truth about AI in the workplace, as he details how to leverage AI to extract value from your SharePoint, Office 365, and now Microsoft 365 investments. The session includes a live demo of how the Microsoft Graph today helps your SharePoint-based information compliance initiatives.
Topic Computing - Information Presented The Way You ThinkDavid Lavenda
Information workers use over 9 apps/day, and have more than half of them open at any one time. This work experience makes it difficult for them to focus on what's important and to see the big picture. New developments in artificial intelligence, specifically natural language processing and machine learning, offer a new way to interact with the apps we already have - by topics. Cognitive science teaches us that our brains think in terms of associated topics, so it just makes sense that our interaction with technology should be in terms of topics, such as customer, product, or service, rather than by apps such as Outlook, Word, Salesforce, and Zendesk. This presentation describes the promise of Topic Computing
Artificial intelligence is purported to improve workplace productivity. But does it really? This presentation takes a hard look at where AI is today and which aspects can truly help today's Digital Workplace improve productivity.
Office 2016 introduces Office Groups which is a new collaboration workspace. But Microsoft already has a collaboration workspace...SharePoint team web sites. What is the difference between the two and which one is the right tool for your collaboration project?
SharePoint Online and Office 365 retain some of the challenges present in Microsoft on-premises offerings. This presentation highlights some things you need to consider when you move to the cloud http://ow.ly/Qw9TK
The average workday has become disjointed. While workers enjoy the “freedom” that comes from being able to do their jobs without being chained to their desks, it is not without its obstacles. There is certainly no shortage of mobile apps for employees, yet each app only does one thing well, and it is becoming clear that work information is spread out between too many apps. As employees rely more on mobile access, the elusive single-screen, unified mobile experience could be the answer to enterprise information discovery woes. The presentation discusses ways to overcome the information overload challenge using contextual capabilities now provided by mobile devices, a consolidated user experience, and activity streams.
Two Strategies for Going Mobile: Which One is for You?David Lavenda
Four customer case-studies that demonstrate the merits of alternative strategies for ensuring the success of your mobile initiatives:
• delivering mass appeal mobile apps, or,
• rolling out high-value, mobile business services
Smart businesses understand that successful organizational initiatives entail a lot more than just buying technology. They require crafting and executing a results-oriented business strategy, a people strategy, as well as a technology strategy.
Beyond Email-The Next Step in BYOD - Sept 2013David Lavenda
BYOD has become mostly just email and calendaring. This presentation looks at some of the challenges of BYOD and what you need to do to get real business value out of mobile devices. It presents ways to get secure, full-featured access to Office 365 and SharePoint from any mobile device.
Information Overload - Can Activity Streams Help?David Lavenda
Workers increasingly need to track important business activities while on the go and initiatives like ‘Bring Your Own Device’ (BYOD) are helping by making devices to the mobile workforce. But the smaller tablet and smartphone form factors dictate a new user experience. Providing a meaningful mobile experience means much more than rolling out a mobile app. New “twitter-like” application activity streams represent a breakthrough because these streams can keep workers aware of updates while on the go. However, activity streams represent the next major source of information overload, since unmitigated streams create a ‘stream of unconsciousness’ that is impossible to follow. Automated filtering and context-aware technology provide some hope, but these technologies are still in their infancy. This presentation looks at the promise, as well as the issues provided by activity streams, and it proposes practical strategies for providing ‘anytime, anywhere’ activity updates in a secure and scale-able environment.
Distractions in the workplace are nothing new, but technology has made them much worse. This presentation looks at the causes of workplace distractions, and offers several strategies for dealing them, both for individuals, and for organizations. Information overload and context switching are identified as two key problems that must be dealt with. Since organizations have invested heavily in collaboration tools, workers are faced with a coterie of products that don't work together well. The result is a day spent toggling between multiple applications to complete basic business tasks. Case in point: the New York Times found that workers typically change windows 37 times an hour. But how do you solve this problem with out having to change a worker's daily habits or behavior? One solution is social email - a way to reduce context switching by aggregating existing collaboration tools in the one window that is open all day at work - email. Single context, one window...but no 'pane.'
GraphRAG is All You need? LLM & Knowledge GraphGuy Korland
Guy Korland, CEO and Co-founder of FalkorDB, will review two articles on the integration of language models with knowledge graphs.
1. Unifying Large Language Models and Knowledge Graphs: A Roadmap.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.08302
2. Microsoft Research's GraphRAG paper and a review paper on various uses of knowledge graphs:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/blog/graphrag-unlocking-llm-discovery-on-narrative-private-data/
LF Energy Webinar: Electrical Grid Modelling and Simulation Through PowSyBl -...DanBrown980551
Do you want to learn how to model and simulate an electrical network from scratch in under an hour?
Then welcome to this PowSyBl workshop, hosted by Rte, the French Transmission System Operator (TSO)!
During the webinar, you will discover the PowSyBl ecosystem as well as handle and study an electrical network through an interactive Python notebook.
PowSyBl is an open source project hosted by LF Energy, which offers a comprehensive set of features for electrical grid modelling and simulation. Among other advanced features, PowSyBl provides:
- A fully editable and extendable library for grid component modelling;
- Visualization tools to display your network;
- Grid simulation tools, such as power flows, security analyses (with or without remedial actions) and sensitivity analyses;
The framework is mostly written in Java, with a Python binding so that Python developers can access PowSyBl functionalities as well.
What you will learn during the webinar:
- For beginners: discover PowSyBl's functionalities through a quick general presentation and the notebook, without needing any expert coding skills;
- For advanced developers: master the skills to efficiently apply PowSyBl functionalities to your real-world scenarios.
Key Trends Shaping the Future of Infrastructure.pdfCheryl Hung
Keynote at DIGIT West Expo, Glasgow on 29 May 2024.
Cheryl Hung, ochery.com
Sr Director, Infrastructure Ecosystem, Arm.
The key trends across hardware, cloud and open-source; exploring how these areas are likely to mature and develop over the short and long-term, and then considering how organisations can position themselves to adapt and thrive.
Smart TV Buyer Insights Survey 2024 by 91mobiles.pdf91mobiles
91mobiles recently conducted a Smart TV Buyer Insights Survey in which we asked over 3,000 respondents about the TV they own, aspects they look at on a new TV, and their TV buying preferences.
Connector Corner: Automate dynamic content and events by pushing a buttonDianaGray10
Here is something new! In our next Connector Corner webinar, we will demonstrate how you can use a single workflow to:
Create a campaign using Mailchimp with merge tags/fields
Send an interactive Slack channel message (using buttons)
Have the message received by managers and peers along with a test email for review
But there’s more:
In a second workflow supporting the same use case, you’ll see:
Your campaign sent to target colleagues for approval
If the “Approve” button is clicked, a Jira/Zendesk ticket is created for the marketing design team
But—if the “Reject” button is pushed, colleagues will be alerted via Slack message
Join us to learn more about this new, human-in-the-loop capability, brought to you by Integration Service connectors.
And...
Speakers:
Akshay Agnihotri, Product Manager
Charlie Greenberg, Host
Kubernetes & AI - Beauty and the Beast !?! @KCD Istanbul 2024Tobias Schneck
As AI technology is pushing into IT I was wondering myself, as an “infrastructure container kubernetes guy”, how get this fancy AI technology get managed from an infrastructure operational view? Is it possible to apply our lovely cloud native principals as well? What benefit’s both technologies could bring to each other?
Let me take this questions and provide you a short journey through existing deployment models and use cases for AI software. On practical examples, we discuss what cloud/on-premise strategy we may need for applying it to our own infrastructure to get it to work from an enterprise perspective. I want to give an overview about infrastructure requirements and technologies, what could be beneficial or limiting your AI use cases in an enterprise environment. An interactive Demo will give you some insides, what approaches I got already working for real.
The Art of the Pitch: WordPress Relationships and SalesLaura Byrne
Clients don’t know what they don’t know. What web solutions are right for them? How does WordPress come into the picture? How do you make sure you understand scope and timeline? What do you do if sometime changes?
All these questions and more will be explored as we talk about matching clients’ needs with what your agency offers without pulling teeth or pulling your hair out. Practical tips, and strategies for successful relationship building that leads to closing the deal.
Essentials of Automations: Optimizing FME Workflows with ParametersSafe Software
Are you looking to streamline your workflows and boost your projects’ efficiency? Do you find yourself searching for ways to add flexibility and control over your FME workflows? If so, you’re in the right place.
Join us for an insightful dive into the world of FME parameters, a critical element in optimizing workflow efficiency. This webinar marks the beginning of our three-part “Essentials of Automation” series. This first webinar is designed to equip you with the knowledge and skills to utilize parameters effectively: enhancing the flexibility, maintainability, and user control of your FME projects.
Here’s what you’ll gain:
- Essentials of FME Parameters: Understand the pivotal role of parameters, including Reader/Writer, Transformer, User, and FME Flow categories. Discover how they are the key to unlocking automation and optimization within your workflows.
- Practical Applications in FME Form: Delve into key user parameter types including choice, connections, and file URLs. Allow users to control how a workflow runs, making your workflows more reusable. Learn to import values and deliver the best user experience for your workflows while enhancing accuracy.
- Optimization Strategies in FME Flow: Explore the creation and strategic deployment of parameters in FME Flow, including the use of deployment and geometry parameters, to maximize workflow efficiency.
- Pro Tips for Success: Gain insights on parameterizing connections and leveraging new features like Conditional Visibility for clarity and simplicity.
We’ll wrap up with a glimpse into future webinars, followed by a Q&A session to address your specific questions surrounding this topic.
Don’t miss this opportunity to elevate your FME expertise and drive your projects to new heights of efficiency.
Software Delivery At the Speed of AI: Inflectra Invests In AI-Powered QualityInflectra
In this insightful webinar, Inflectra explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming software development and testing. Discover how AI-powered tools are revolutionizing every stage of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), from design and prototyping to testing, deployment, and monitoring.
Learn about:
• The Future of Testing: How AI is shifting testing towards verification, analysis, and higher-level skills, while reducing repetitive tasks.
• Test Automation: How AI-powered test case generation, optimization, and self-healing tests are making testing more efficient and effective.
• Visual Testing: Explore the emerging capabilities of AI in visual testing and how it's set to revolutionize UI verification.
• Inflectra's AI Solutions: See demonstrations of Inflectra's cutting-edge AI tools like the ChatGPT plugin and Azure Open AI platform, designed to streamline your testing process.
Whether you're a developer, tester, or QA professional, this webinar will give you valuable insights into how AI is shaping the future of software delivery.
UiPath Test Automation using UiPath Test Suite series, part 4DianaGray10
Welcome to UiPath Test Automation using UiPath Test Suite series part 4. In this session, we will cover Test Manager overview along with SAP heatmap.
The UiPath Test Manager overview with SAP heatmap webinar offers a concise yet comprehensive exploration of the role of a Test Manager within SAP environments, coupled with the utilization of heatmaps for effective testing strategies.
Participants will gain insights into the responsibilities, challenges, and best practices associated with test management in SAP projects. Additionally, the webinar delves into the significance of heatmaps as a visual aid for identifying testing priorities, areas of risk, and resource allocation within SAP landscapes. Through this session, attendees can expect to enhance their understanding of test management principles while learning practical approaches to optimize testing processes in SAP environments using heatmap visualization techniques
What will you get from this session?
1. Insights into SAP testing best practices
2. Heatmap utilization for testing
3. Optimization of testing processes
4. Demo
Topics covered:
Execution from the test manager
Orchestrator execution result
Defect reporting
SAP heatmap example with demo
Speaker:
Deepak Rai, Automation Practice Lead, Boundaryless Group and UiPath MVP
Epistemic Interaction - tuning interfaces to provide information for AI supportAlan Dix
Paper presented at SYNERGY workshop at AVI 2024, Genoa, Italy. 3rd June 2024
https://alandix.com/academic/papers/synergy2024-epistemic/
As machine learning integrates deeper into human-computer interactions, the concept of epistemic interaction emerges, aiming to refine these interactions to enhance system adaptability. This approach encourages minor, intentional adjustments in user behaviour to enrich the data available for system learning. This paper introduces epistemic interaction within the context of human-system communication, illustrating how deliberate interaction design can improve system understanding and adaptation. Through concrete examples, we demonstrate the potential of epistemic interaction to significantly advance human-computer interaction by leveraging intuitive human communication strategies to inform system design and functionality, offering a novel pathway for enriching user-system engagements.
8. First Real Talking “Appliance”
Kurzweil Reading Machine - 1976
“‟What is it good for?‟ Like a lot
of clever computer software, it
was a solution in search of a
problem.” (Kurzweil 1974)
Focused on the „blind‟ market
after sitting next to a blind man
on an airplane
Cost of machine - $30K-$50K
Cost of same „machine‟ in 2001
- $995 + PC
Source: Kurzweil R. The Age of Spiritual Machines (Viking 1999)
13. Predictions - 1980
[the computer chip]…. “will soon give
voices from everything from blenders to
washing machines.”
“By 1983, the auto industry will replace „idiot
lights‟ on the dashboard with the spoken
word.”
“By Christmas 1981, the market will be
flooded with talking toys, smoke
alarms, and calculators” (Nat. Semi product
manager) “Is America Ready for A Talking Coffee Pot” The Miami News Nov 4 1980 p. 1
Source:
14. Early Talking Appliances
“Hi! I'm a talking vending
machine for Coca Cola.
Thank you for shopping
at XXX.”
[Pause music plays]
“Please make your
selection.”
Source: “Coca-Cola adds life to... its vending machine” Beaver Country Times June 13 1983
23. SCOT
Relevant Social Groups
Interpretative Flexibility
Closure
Stabilization
24. Relevant Social Groups
Consumers, i.e. „mass market‟
Handicapped individuals, esp. blind people
Industrial workers
Suppliers
Chip manufacturers
Appliance manufacturers
distributors
retailers
25. Interpretative Flexibility of Talking
Appliances
Mass consumer market
Gimmick, cool feature, “gadget envy”
Speech is an add-on, doesn‟t need to be comprehensive
Handicapped/blind market
Speech is a necessary function
Speech must be comprehensive
Industrial/specialized applications
Uses for places where people are “blind”
Speech needs to “fill in the holes” when people can‟t “look away”
Manufacturers/distributors/integrators of speech technology
Profit-enabler – sell more product
Offer competitive advantage to “customers” in a huge market
'Please Hurry' Says Newest Alarm Clock (Money Magazine 1980)Talking Appliances - Those New Voices in Your Life (Pop. Science 1982)Have a Chat With a Talking Coke Machine (Montreal Gazette 1982)Coca Cola Adds Life…To Its Vending Machines (Beaver Country Times 1983)Hello 2000: 'It's time to stir the spaghetti‘ (Chicago Tribune 1984)Setting The Tone for the Future – Some Day Your Boss May Be a Machine (LA Times 1984)Let Your Machine Do The Talking (Milwaukee Journal 1984)
“The age of talking appliances is upon us.” (LA Times 1980)Talking appliances that use electronically created synthesized voices are booming everywhere.” (Pop. Science 1982)“The talking Coke vending machine…is being warmly received in the US where more than 100 of them have been on trial for more than a year.” (Montreal Gazette Mar 23 1982)“The age of the talking appliance is only a computer chip away” (Miami News, 1980)
Not quite sure how to sell it – just add voice to everything and let see what happens“Right now…we’ve got it – but we we’ve got to figure out what to do with it.” (prod manager at General Instruments)“People are more likely to pay attention to a voice than a buzzer…the results were much better with a woman’s voice whispering in their ears (NASA study of pilot’s reaction to voice commands)”
People got fed up with talking machines which just annoyed them. If they malfunctioned, you couldn’t shut them up. The story about the paper jam in the copier, the seat belt in the car, etc. – just couldn’t shut those machines up.
Headlines of the times“TALKING APPLIANCES COULD TURN HOUSE INTO A NAGGING NIGHTMARE” (Orlando Sentinel 1985)“Today's machines are good listeners - and they don't talk back.” (Chicago Sun Times 1987)“Consumers Balk at Devices That Talk” (News-Journal 1988)TALKING MACHINES: CONSUMERS ARE NOT READY FOR THEM (New Sunday Times 1988)AFTER FIVE YEARS CONSUMER RESISTANCE KILLS TALKING APPLIANCES (NY Times 1988)Forget a fill-up; how about a shut-up? (Dallas Morning News)
Reasons given for why it failed – all from the newspapersWas seen as a gimmick – no real value to consumersVoices didn’t sound naturalNever captured the imagination of consumers People were shocked by the voices. The culture never really gives us enough time to prepare for technology. There’s not enough of a buffer zone Consumers did not want machines ordering them around. We’re not willing to give them authority over us. We don’t trust them and we don’t know what they’ll tell us to do next. (Whirlpool) “We wanted our [dryer] to be nonirritating. The people we tested it on thought the voice was all right. They didn’t like the fact that the dryer talked in the first place.”Men didn't want to be prodded by a male voice.“ It aroused their competitive instincts. But a nudge from a female voice wasn't so bad but…Women did not want their husbands listening to a woman's voice whispering "washer fluid is low" or "trunk lid is ajar”
In the end, people just hated the appliances.“It’s the ultimate in intrusiveness. These cars tell you to close the door. What’s next the toilet that says ‘Flush again?’”“I know I don’t respond very well when a car tells me what to do. My first reaction is to punch it and I’m a civilized person.” (prod manager at a voice chip manuf)“What’s the difference between a mother who says ‘wake up’ and an alarm clock that says the same? The car and the driving instructor who command you to ‘fasten your seat belt? The teacher and the elevator who that order you to ‘close the door?” There is no difference. All of them talk. None of them listen. You can’t say ‘Shut up’ to any of them.“When we first had it [microwave oven] it was really wonderful and a unique experience to punch your oven and have it say “high” or “medium high” or “defrost.” I had hoped it would tell me how the food was doing or make suggestions on how I might do it better, but the problem was that it only told you the temperature. It was like a roommate that didn’t work out.”