On The Right Path
Voice recognition has been here for many years, but only recently have we begun seeing huge improvements to this technology through Alexa, Google and Siri. These assistants are helping out with a range of tasks such as controlling smart home devices and telling us how long it will take to get to work based on current traffic. Moreover they link into search engines to answer questions you may have.
Buying With Voice
When you want to buy something from Amazon, you can say “Alexa, buy shampoo”, and it will return “amazon’s choice” of shampoo. Not the least expensive shampoo, not necessarily the best shampoo, but “amazon’s choice”. It is essentially making the purchasing decision for you which is very interesting because whoever supplies this product, has a competitive gain over other brands. If you work in the industry of selling products on Amazon, now would be a great time to look into how amazon uses Alexa to order products.
Although this is currently not our main method of shopping, it may be how we do all our shopping in the future as home assistant devices get more and more popular.
Goodbye Physical Keyboard
Physical keyboards will phase out as voice recognition evolves and gets better at understanding us. We have already seen the physical keyboard phase out in mobile phones, replaced with the touch screen keyboard.
With this being said, just because we can take notes on our smart phone, doesn’t mean we have stopped using written notes, it can depend on what works better for different tasks. An example of a use for keyboards at the peak of voice technology would be computer programming. Programming can contain complex code with various styling, not so easy to convey using voice alone, but as technology evolves so will how we program.
As well as keyboards, television remotes will no longer be needed and in time televisions will phase out with the rise of virtual reality.
Talking to Our Cars
With companies like Tesla and Google creating self-driving cars, we can expect voice recognition integrated within them from day one. You will get in your car, tell the car where you want to go and it will take you there. Your car will essentially be your own personal taxi. Want to change route? … “take the next right”. This also allows us to stay in control of the car incase of emergency.
The future is bright with the rise of voice technologies and will add value to our lives, increasing productivity in our day-to-day lives.