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All of these metaphors are pretty temporal. It changes so often I’m not sure we “solve” it. I taught community college for a spell, computers 101. When you go back to the very beginning and have to explain desktops and folders and files and file types to the same people who have little to no familiarity with moving a mouse... it’s profound how un-intuitive all of computing is... from the very beginning. I think of th…
Thanks for sharing your unique perspective. With the recent advent of VUI (voice user interface e.g. Alexa, Siri, Google Assistant) and the fact it will eventually pass the uncanny valley given sufficient iterations/user feedback/time, do you see this as the start of a paradigm shift from an era of error prone, unusable gesture-based computing devices to seamlessly intuitive natural voice-driven experiences?
People often need to stop speaking, and often ask for silence, when they need to think. Thinking and Talking is definitely a useful modality (think, relationship discussions, brainstorming), but Thinking and Non-verbalism is also a necessary way to function. Think of when your partner goes silent in a conversation and you look over and they're starting at their phone, or doing something on their phone. People can't talk and do something else at the same time.
I work from home. I often wake up, go for a run, eat breakfast, sit at my computer, begin my workday, and when my first conference call of the day begins... find myself a little rusty at speaking. It seems like "talking" has a spin-up cycle for some people.
I don't want to talk to my computers... so I haven't yet developed any positive notions of living with a VUI.