Alexa, Siri and Google Assistant - not the personal assistants you think they are…
When I first saw the movie ‘Iron Man’, I remember how much I wanted my own Jarvis (Tony Stark’s AI assistant). I’m sure I wasn’t alone.
Then came Siri — Apple’s voice assistant on the iPhone. I remember the commercial where all those people were on the move and they just asked Siri to handle tasks they didn’t want to stop and manually take care of. It looked pretty awesome — even if it didn’t really perform as advertised.
Alexa was next. I was genuinely in awe of what they had created. Whereas Siri was hit-or-miss with understanding what you’d asked, it seemed like Alexa almost always got it. It was the first time you felt like you could have a conversation with AI.
Google Assistant didn’t stand out to me until I saw that demonstration where GA called a hair salon to set up an appointment. That was incredible. But that was two years ago and I haven’t seen that level of AI assistant capability available for general use. Why? I’m not sure, but I think some of the reasons also point to why these voice assistants are not, and will not, be the future personal assistants everyone assumes they’ll be.
When you think about tech, it helps to think of it in terms of tools. Imagine that your smartphone is a toolbox. Inside of it, you have all different sorts of tools that accomplish different things. You carry around your toolbox and reach into it for whichever tool is needed when the moment comes.
What’s better than having a toolbox full of tools? Someone to use them for you!
Creating an assistant to manage the tools is the logical next step in providing more tech convenience for consumers. But here is where we start to think differently about what we want, and why we want it.
It’s one thing to have a voice interface that I control and only does what I tell it to — the voice version of the taps and swipes I perform on my phone/computer/tablet — and it’s an entirely different equation when I turn over that decision-making power to a company.
Let’s use the example of the Google Assistant calling to set up a hair appointment on behalf of a user. Once we get over the awe of the technological achievement (which is very impressive) — the average person will start to consider other factors.
Why did the Google Assistant call that particular hair salon?
Well … how would you chose? It would be a combination of price, location, expected availability, word of mouth, online reviews — all seen through the lens of your preference.
Is that the exact same list that Google would use to make the choice? Maybe. Maybe not. What if Google called the hair salon that paid for Google Assistant search results in order to drive more traffic to their salon?
Motive matters. You won’t be happy having a personal assistant who makes decisions that consider the interests of a trillion-dollar tech company.
So, yes, they are and will continue to be great voice interface assistants. You can tell them what you want them to do with your speakers, phones, computers and apps. But when you need to turn over the decision making power to someone, and feel comfortable trusting them, that’s when you have a real personal assistant — whether it’s AI or a person.
Better Ai was built to be that trustworthy assistant. No motive-questioning required.
To learn about how Better Ai works: https://betterai.ai/how-does-it-work
To learn more about specific features of Better Ai: https://betterai.ai/features
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