Wow. Things are happening in a much more rapid time frame now than they used to. I am not just talking about Moore's Law for technophiles. But life as we know it is increasingly becoming, rapid. In every way.
For one example - I have hosted Gov20LA for four years now. Next year, 2014 will be the 5th annual event. Every year we have streamed the event, then ultimately put the videos of each speaker up online as an archive. This year, in 2013, Techzulu live streamed it on Youtube and it was available immediately, in full as an archived live stream event. Nine and half hours of mostly unedited and raw footage from the livestream event. We will be releasing the individual videos soon too.
How rapid has life become? Well thanks to Siri and Svoice - the Samsung equivalent; we can now talk to our email, to our navigation systems, to our friends, to our phones, and also if you plan ahead can post from voice to your twitter or facebook status updates.
Now at first this all seems like fun, "a shiny new toy" as I referred to it in my opening remarks for Gov20LA 2013. Then it gets serious, like when a Siri voice command to an Apple Mapping tool results in a wrong turn or an accident. Or when an Svoice misunderstood word becomes something else altogether in the context of a live tweet or facebook post.
How soon till we start seeing voice driven digital character assassination replete with slang and provisional dialects? I mean if you can do it from your car while driving (not necessarily a good idea) or whilst standing on a street corner talking to your phone - how long till this becomes the tool of choice for bullies, stalkers, harassers and worse, government agents or corporate big brother agents using it to get around rules about emails, written letters etc? It becomes a much more rapid thing when someone can just say it rather than have to type it.
On the other hand - the freedom to speak - quite literally - and to generate status updates to social media, or send encrypted emails, or send ones actual location - and any other number of things provide a power unheard of before in human history. Now - without wasting the time of typing something - if you tune up Siri or Svoice and train them to learn your voice and commands - the results are astoundingly powerful.
You too can tell us about last night's dinner simply, by well, talking. Or you can be bad and assert your rights to freedom of speech and speak to looking like a jackass. Go ahead. No one is stopping you, yet. Just remember, a voice to tweet or voice to facebook post - while getting around email rules, does not get around all the other ones specifically created to not let people abuse technology.
As published originally on Silberberg Innovations.