The trouble with Siri
Autor: Lanika Rigues | Publicado: 2011-10-27T14:27:00-02:00

In one word: people. In one phrase: people that lack education a.k.a. douchebags. They'll want the shiny.

You see, when you think about a personal assistant Jetsons-like, you like to think about a perfect, idealized futuristic ambient. Reality has a LOT more noise. Technology can be blameless but the WAY people use it...

I live in a megalopolis where the majority of people seems to be composed by entitled egotistical narcissists with lack of empathy for anyone around them that isn't, well, THEM. I don't need to name names. If you live in a megalopolis, I'm pretty sure that people around you are eerily similar.

Here, specifically, we have a cultural problem of teens that love to hear loud terrible music on their cell phones. In the metro. Crowded metro. At rush hour. They have ear plugs, every fucking phone comes with them, but they REFUSE to use it. Try to imagine traveling with 3, 4 of these guys blasting music in the highest volume their cell phones can reach about "bitches taking it in da ass". 3, 4 different cellphones screaming at you at top levels at the same time for how long you take to commute. Every. day. And if you try to complain, they tell you to go fuck yourself. Sweet, uh?

Oh, but these young men are black and poor and yadayada you bigot you. Okay, try this one for size: I like to take the baby for a stroll in the park near home. When she falls asleep I usually sit on a bench, take my moleskine out and start doodling. But soon the human zoo around me demands attention, not even ONE of them paying attention to the green, beautiful park they're crossing: the young gangsta ones with their cellphones blasting music are here too, but also the 50-ish white dudes SCREAMING in their smartphones, many times on hands free/speakerphone about anything from business to where to go for dinner and once in a while disgusting details of their medical history that you shouldn't go around screaming to anyone to hear. Then you distract yourself trying to draw and another guy passes buy, no cellphone visible, screaming to himself while jogging. Schizophrenia? Nope. This douchebag has a bluetooth earplug. Women aren't exactly better. Once I heard an entire conversation between a girl in the bus and her boyfriend trying to make some sexy phone talk... while she was on speakerphone! The ENTIRE bus could hear the old "what are you wearing" and "I wanna do this and that to you, sexy" routine. Try to ask these people not to do this and the answer will be the same: fuck you (or the rich white dude version: who do you think YOU are to talk to me? Do you know WHO I am? Fuck you.) 

As you can see, being an entitled asshole here is independent of age, class, money, skin color or gender. 

Can you imagine this kind of person with an iPhone 4S in hands? Screaming bad jokes at Siri or asking their smartphones in the middle of a crowd if they want to sit on their dick? Just imagine a room full of these assholes talking to their phones. In the theater!

In a perfect world you would use it at home, in your car, on your own room at work and even in your bathroom*... but the world we live in is far from perfect and the fault is in our own lack of education. I'm no better than most and use my smartphone a LOT but at least my excess typing doesn't add to the cacophony around me.

Everyone's screaming, honking and blasting and not one of them are hearing themselves. Unfortunately, LOTS of them will have iPhones 4S in hands and when other brands follow in some months or years, we'll hear a LOT more douchebags screaming to their smartphones AND their smartphones screaming back. Fun future, uh?

*I heard a woman's conversation once in an office public restroom about how she would fire her nanny, screaming on speakerphone while taking a dump on the stall left to mine. PLEASE don't do it in a public place.