Saturday, February 6, 2010

Boiling over

If somebody graphs the downfall of human civilization I would bet the jump-the-shark moment occurred the day the customer service representative was replaced by an automated computer answering service.
Now I know I can sometimes mumble but generally I don't feel like I cannot be understood in my normal life. That is until I need to access a bank account of book a flight online or ask about my bank account.

The "conversation" inevitably degenerates to me repeating myself so many times that I curse into the phone demanding I speak with an operator. It's not that I am against technology but there has to be something in the technology which gets us from point A to B more quickly or easily for us to want to use it.

You are trying to ask a simple question and instead of getting to an operator they put you through some touch-tone lambada. The biggest issue is that whenever they ask you to speak your answers the voice recognition programs mis-hear you leaving you to have to constantly repeat yourself which only boils the blood even more. This leaves you from a simple errand to a something which feels like a life's undertaking.

See these voice recognition programs aren't getting us any closer to artificial intelligence but instead pulling us from civility. I don't know what kind of speech-pattern you need to be understood but apparently the Dutch accent mixed with Jersey slang wasn't properly vetted in this approach.

Next time just patch me into an Indian technician and be done with it.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

No comments: