Smartphones
Does Your SmartPhone Understand You?
Mine sure doesn’t
I can’t spell — dyslexia and all — and I wanted the word scrawny for a poem. Every version I typed was redlined. It was the only word that would do. You writers of poetry know what I mean-that one and only Goldilocks word that fits “just right.”
Plan B: I used my phone’s speech-recognition service Siri to search for the word. I spoke the word holding the phone about 18 inches away from my mouth. “Hey, Siri, how do you spell scrawny?” In return, Ms. Siri replies “Ronnie-R.O.N.N.I.E.” I tried again, “Granny,” then “Scroll,” “Grande,” (which she tells me means “tall” in French) then “Scratchy.” No, No, No, NO!!
Plan C: I tried speaking louder. I tried speaking softer. I over articulated deconstructing the phonemes “ssss… ccccrrrr… aaawww…ny.” Nothing.
Plan D: Walk away. Try some other day. Back in grad school, my mentor showed me one of my papers, which had a big red line across page 3. She said with a grin, “Here is where you came back from a break.” “How do you know that?” I asked. “You misspelled this particular word consistently. Then suddenly it is correct for the rest of the paper.” I went through other papers, and sure enough — the pattern she had detected was very clear.
Oh, you’d like to read the poem with scrawny in it? I walked away for so long I can’t remember which one it is in :-(
Are there solutions?
I wondered what could be done about my not that smartphone misunderstanding me? Surely someone out on the world-wide-web has a solution. An extensive Google search, meaning I went beyond page one, revealed almost nothing of use.
The recommendations were:
- speak naturally- well that failed
- hold the phone close- this may be where I failed
- don’t over articulate-but I’m an over articulator by training
- train Siri to understand- so of course, that means a trip to YouTube to figure out what that means.
A funny thing happened on the way to submission
I meet weekly with a group of writer friends over zoom. We listen to and edit each other’s work, give suggestions for clarity, and cheer each other on. As I read out loud the sentence, “Hey Siri, how do you spell scrawny?” She answered! And this time she got it correct. I exclaimed, “Oh my God, she’s answering.” To which she replied “Oh my God a phrase often said as OMG. Some people find Oh my God offensive.”
Ever wonder how voice-recognition works in the first place?
I found this very informative article by Jerry Lu. Lasers? Yes, the future of microphones is laser beams directed at our faces.
Turns out that dust and dog dander may be the culprit keeping my smartphone from understanding me.
How do you get your phone to listen? All hints and suggestions are appreciated.
Thanks to my editor-writer friends Kris Downey, PegMeg Cypher, Aslynn Roe, Rolinda LeMay, and Lisa (when are you gonna finally join Medium?)