Tell HN: My five year old is convinced Siri is a real person
3 by ddingus | 0 comments on Hacker News.
From time to time, we have had the discussions here about whether actually naming these assistive agents makes any sense. And there are pros and cons either way when you compare OK Google to Siri. When I showed this particular five-year-old OK Google, she was interested, but didn't really do much with it. Then she discovered Siri. Since that time she has used Siri nonstop. Asking all kinds of crazy things, and series doing a pretty fair job on those conversations. Some of which are frankly hilarious! I thought it might make for some interesting discussion. My observation is that her ability to address it in the same way she addresses other people has proven very compelling. The skills she already has she can use and get something meaningful. Identifying with Siri as a person seems to map right over in her mind, and she thinks she's getting a real person, the kind of attention a young person craves. She asked what time of day it is, what the weather will be like, how many Sexes do frogs have, how come papa calls me squid, all kinds of crazy things. That's it, I think naming these agents have advantages. It's a lower friction UX experience, and I think if we're interested in capturing the up-and-coming people, this matter is worth some thought. Edit: the real fun part in all of this is just how difficult I am finding it to convince her otherwise. To her mind a lot of things are evidence that you and I wouldn't count as evidence but she does. It'll be an interesting few days working through this. Maybe longer, who knows?